Aquino reacts to viral open letter on 'pork' detention cells

MANILA, Philippines — President Benigno Aquino III on Tuesday reacted to an open letter criticizing the perceived special treatment to the senators detained in connection with the pork barrel scam.

The letter, which has been making the rounds online, compared the detention cells of Senators Ramon Revilla Jr. and Jinggoy Estrada with that of the President's father, the late Senator Benigno Aquino Jr. during Martial Law.

John Silva, the writer of the viral letter, noted that the "huge comfy" detention cells of Revilla and Estrada were 10 times bigger than the one given to the President's martyred father.

"Your dad didn't go to jail for stealing. He was into more heady stuff like a return to democracy, human rights and moral convictions. So why the hell are you treating these senators with kid gloves, these guys who can't seem to recall, account, or sign off on billions of missing pesos?" Silva said in his letter.

In response, Aquino said it is difficult to compare the detention cells of his father and of the two senators.

"Baka mahirap i-kontra, 'yung i-compare, dahil talagang ang tinarget [noong Martial Law ay si Ninoy]," Aquino told the media during his working visit in Japan yesterday, which was shown on television reports.

But he added that "to be fair," his father's detention cell in Fort Bonifacio had air conditioning "at some point." The late senator, Aquino also said, was allowed to come out of his room for one hour every day.

The President echoed, however, Silva's description of his father's difficulties during his nearly eight-year detention.

"[F]or somebody who is a very sociable being like my dad, 'yung solitary confinement was really, shall we say, a mental torture," the President said.

Silva wants the President to visit his father's detention cell and then do some "serious and immediate changes" to the "cushy jail arrangements" for Revilla and Estrada.

"Like your dad’s, give them cells that make them sweat and agonize and realize their thieving days were a blight on our people... Stop indulging the accused we are now thoroughly repulsed with or else you diminish what your father, Senator Ninoy Aquino, stood and was killed for," said Silva, civic leader and executive director of the Ortigas Foundation Library.

On Tuesday, Malacañang also reacted to Silva's open letter and admitted that the country needs judicial reforms.

"We acknowledge that we continue to deal with a criminal justice system that needs to be overhauled and reformed in order to be truly fair and equitable," Presidential Communications Operations Office Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said.

Coloma assured that the Palace will pursue judicial reforms while hoping that the Sandiganbayan will conduct a fair and speedy trial of the pork barrel scam cases.

Estrada, Revilla and Senate minority leader Juan Ponce Enrile are facing plunder and graft charges for supposedly amassing kickbacks by coursing their pork barrel funds to dubious foundations of businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles with the help of government agencies and officials.

The Sandiganbayan has ordered the arrest of Estrada and Revilla, who have both surrendered and are now detained at the Philippine National Police Custodial Center in Camp Crame. - Louis Bacani