Zaldy wants hospital check-up

MANILA, Philippines - Suspended governor Zaldy Ampatuan of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) has asked the Quezon City court handling the Maguindanao massacre trial to allow him to undergo hospital check-up for his diabetes.

“We want him to undergo an examination due to his fluctuating blood pressure and sugar level brought about perhaps by the changing weather,” Ampatuan lawyer Redemberto Villanueva told reporters.

Villanueva filed his motion before Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes of Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 221 yesterday morning.

The court earlier allowed Ampatuan and his father Andal Ampatuan Sr. to undergo regular check-up. As per the request made by Senior Inspector Edgar Camus, a physician from the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) will check the two regularly.

A member of the prosecution said they don’t have any problem with the former governor undergoing a check-up “as long as he undergoes arraignment first.”

“It will be a flight risk if we allow him to be confined without undergoing arraignment,” the prosecutor said.

Meanwhile, two justices of the Court of Appeals (CA) have inhibited themselves in the petition seeking to clear the suspended governor in the Maguindanao massacre case.

Associate Justices Danton Bueser and Marlene Gonzales-Sison have excused themselves from hearing the case in the 11th division of the appellate court, as they did in a similar case involving the Andal patriarch.

With their inhibition, two other justices- Associate Justice Josefina Salonga and Romeo Barza were picked to take their place in the CA division of five. The two will join Associate Justices Noej Tijam, Jose Reyes Jr. and Mario Guarina III in resolving the petition of Ampatuan seeking to nullify the resolution of Department of Justice approving his indictment for the carnage.