ZTE officials may be charged with bribery

MANILA, Philippines – Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano, chairman of the Senate Blue Ribbon committee, clarified yesterday that officials of ZTE Corp., the Chinese firm involved in the alleged overpricing and bribery over the $329-million national broadband network (NBN) contract with the government, could also be recommended for prosecution for bribery.

“Under Philippine laws when we talk about bribery, you don’t look at the nationality. If you look at the nationality, then what they will do is just get a foreigner to bribe somebody. So if we do conclude that there was bribery here we will not look at the nationality,” Cayetano said.

He said bribery “is always two ways” and transactions involving foreign governments must be under stricter scrutiny. In the case of the NBN deal, however, kickbacks turned out to be higher as they ran in millions of dollars.

“The kickback issues will be the major part of the report,” Cayetano said.

ZTE officials allegedly worked with the Filipino brokers of the NBN deal that was overpriced to accommodate fat commissions.

Among those implicated in the NBN-ZTE bribery were First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo, resigned Commission on Elections chairman Benjamin Abalos, businessmen Ruben Reyes, Leo San Miguel and retired police general Quirino dela Torre.

Abalos admitted knowing the ZTE officials but denied asking for commissions brokering the project.

Commission on Higher Education chairman Romulo Neri testified in the Senate that Abalos offered him P200 million in bribe to approve the project when he was then the head of the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA).

He said President Arroyo ordered him to approve the project despite but reject the bribe.

Businessman Jose de Venecia III, son of former Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr. and another witness in the controversial deal, and NEDA consultant Rodolfo Noel Lozada Jr. testified that Mr. Arroyo and Abalos brokered the deal.

Lozada said his role as technical consultant was to “moderate the greed” of those asking for commissions from the project amounting to up to $130 million.

Senate Majority Leader Francis Pangilinan and Sen. Manuel Roxas II said there might actually be no direct testimony to link Mrs. Arroyo to the scandal but this did not mean she would be free of liability.

Pangilinan said the lack of a witness to directly link Mrs. Arroyo to the bribery should not make the Palace happy since it is the result of the determination of the administration to suppress the truth.

Roxas said the people should remember that the President issued Executive Order 464 and Memorandum Circular 108 and invoked executive privilege to prevent executive officials from testifying on various anomalies being investigated at the Senate.

“These were all used to suppress the truth about the ZTE. But despite that there were many hearings that were conducted and the Blue Ribbon committee will make an interim report based on the information that we have gathered so far,” Roxas said.

Senate President Manuel Villar Jr. said he wants the hearings on the NBN deal to resume after the Supreme Court decides on the case filed by Neri regarding executive privilege.

The Court upheld Neri’s invocation of executive privilege in refusing to answer questions on his conversations with Mrs. Arroyo regarding the NBN deal. The Senate has filed a motion for reconsideration on the issue before the SC.