MANILA, Philippines - Former first gentleman Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo, once again denying accusations that he and his wife, former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, received commissions and kickbacks amounting to $30 million from China’s ZTE Corp., asked the Office of the Ombudsman yesterday to junk the plunder case filed against him two months ago.
“Pampanga Rep. Arroyo and I never received any money, let alone bribe money, from ZTE as stated by (Dante) Madriaga,” he said in reference to the testimony of a former consultant of the botched $329-million national broadband network deal who testified during the Senate’s investigation on the alleged anomaly.
“He does not cite any direct evidence or circumstance showing that he was personally privy to the ‘fact’ that Rep. Arroyo and I received any money from ZTE. It seems he simply claims that something was told to him, but it is vague at best,” Mr. Arroyo said in a 34-page counter-affidavit.
In submitting his motion to dismiss, the former first gentleman noted that the latest complaint for plunder filed by Bayan Muna party-list Rep. Teodoro Casiño is nothing but a rehash of allegations which he has already been cleared of by the Office of the Ombudsman in 2009 and 2010.
Mr. Arroyo also again denied having told businessman Jose “Joey” de Venecia III to “back off” from the NBN-ZTE deal during a meeting at the Wack Wack Golf and Country Club in Mandaluyong in March 2007.
“This incident never happened,” he said, noting that even if he did say such words, it does not amount to graft insofar as “requesting or receiving any present, gift or material or pecuniary advantage from any other person having some business, transaction, application, request or contract with the government, in which such public official has to intervene.”
“Complainants have not sufficiently offered any other evidence which show my culpability for plunder or violation of Section 4(a) and 5 of RA 3019, nor have they shown that I have committed any illegal acts in relation to the NBN project,” he stressed.
“Complainants have not offered anything new since the dismissal of the case against me by your Honorable Office in the Joint Resolution of April 21, 2009 and the Joint Order of April 19, 2010. This Complaint-Affidavit should be dismissed,” the petition reads.
‘No probative value’
In 2008, at least four complaints were filed against Arroyo and other respondents on the same accusations, which were consolidated and eventually junked by the anti-graft agency on April 21, 2009 and a joint order rejecting motions for reconsideration dated April 19, 2010.
The decisions resulted in the filing of graft cases against former Commission on Elections (Comelec) chairman Benjamin Abalos and former National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) director general Romulo Neri before the Sandiganbayan.
“Clearly, any acts imputed to me in relation to this transaction, the NBN project, has been disposed of by your Office in the previous complaints. The decision of your Office is already final, that’s why the complainants had to file Petitions for Certiorari, a special civil action, with the Supreme Court due to the finality of your (decisions),” his counter-affidavit reads.
He said there is no evidence and probable cause to indict him for graft or plunder because of the “incompetent evidence” presented by the complainants, which includes a Senate investigation report that was supposed to have been conducted in aid of legislation and not to determine guilt of an accused.
He said the Senate committee report is of no probative value and useless for the purpose of determining probable cause.
“Its admissibility is questionable being that of a Senate investigation conducted in aid of legislation and not to determine criminal guilt, and more importantly, in the conduct of this investigation, the Senate does not adhere to the technical rules of evidence applicable to judicial or quasi-judicial proceedings,” he said.
Mr. Arroyo said the Office of the Ombudsman has even actually ruled that the NBN-ZTE deal is not anomalous when it said in its April 21, 2009, decision that “the contention and comparison as to which proposal is more economically, technically and developmentally viable is beyond dispute.”