Induced to hack at Joker, Corpus

The cat’s out of the bag. Two cohorts of supposed whistleblower Robert Rivero have confessed that they were induced by Senators Ping Lacson and Ed Angara to lie against Senator Joker Arroyo and Col. Victor Corpus. The two, Bulacan reporters Art Sampana and Jun Acot, also swore they were offered huge cash rewards to link First Gentleman Mike Arroyo and Senator Robert Barbers to drug lords. They now wish to come clean. But they hinted at deals gone sour with Rivero, whom they described as a master of AC-DC (attack and collect, defend and collect) journalism.

Everything started fine and dandy, going by Sampana’s affidavit executed last week. He narrated a meeting on Aug. 22 with Atty. Demaree Raval, Angara’s legal aide, in which his attacks on Joker and Corpus were perfected. Present in that meeting at Philippine Plaza Hotel were Rivero, who had just been sacked from the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office for extorting money from radio stations in exchange for ad contracts and speedy billings. Also there were Lacson’s PR adviser and two lawyers from Angara’s law firm. Rivero introduced Sampana to them: "Ito ang kasama nating gigiba kay Corpus."

AFP intelligence chief Corpus was on the warpath. A Senate inquiry had just begun on his press exposé about Lacson’s alleged masterminding of a growing narcotrade, kidnapping for ransom, murder, smuggling and money laundering. Barbers was heading the tri-committee investigation. Joker was chairman of one of the committees.

At the hotel business center, Raval told Sampana to prepare a sworn statement to discredit Corpus, for use in the Senate hearings. Rivero said he already had prepared his own statement against Joker. Eventually, they were to corroborate each other’s claims.

The lawyers then typed and printed from a computer Sampana’s line that as far back as 1997, he often met Corpus at the ISAFP compound where he was under custody for a drug case. Sampana also claimed he saw then-ISAFP chief Gen. Benjamin Libarnes meeting with known Lacson foes Gen. Jose Calimlim and Chief Supt. Roberto Lastimoso, who would later become intelligence chief and PNP head, respectively, under President Joseph Estrada. Even back then, Sampana’s statement would make it appear, the AFP and PNP officers were ganging up on Lacson and trying to link him to drug lord Alfredo Tiongco.

Sampana swore in his Oct. 31 affidavit that he merely cooked these up with Raval. He never met Corpus in 1997.

But back to Aug. 22: After the statement was taken, Raval phoned Angara. Lacson’s PR man also called his boss. Raval then told Sampana to add four sensational items to the statement:

(1) that Mike Arroyo had approached Tiongco’s front-man Florencio Parena to not implicate then-Sen. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to drugs;

(2) that Joker Arroyo paid Rivero P160,000 to keep quiet about PCSO; (3) that Barbers was responsible for the release of arrested drug lord Lawrence Hwang; and

(4) that Pareno was only forced by ISAFP to link Senator Vicente Sotto to Tiongco.

Sampana flatly refused to add the first three items. He at first protested the fourth because it was public knowledge that Sotto and Tiongco were close friends. But he acceeded to Raval;s proddings.

When they finished drafting the statement before noon, Rivero and Lacson’s PR man left with a promise to Sampana of a cash advance from the senator. Raval and Sampana proceeded to the Senate so Angara can review the statement. Over lunch Sampana signed the document, after which he was given P10,000 and a promise of more to come from Rivero.

Sampana has long known Rivero, he said in his Oct. 31 affidavit. They were editors at the Luzon Pen, a Bulacan tabloid that closed shop in 1997 when its chairman Tiongco and publisher Parena were linked to narcotrafficking. Rivero became news editor of a radio station; Sampana helped set up another paper. In 1998 Sampana’s new boss asked to be introduced to Senator Tessie Oreta for a P200-million government textbook deal he was working on. Sampana linked him up with Rivero, who was then covering the Senate beat for his radio station and whose wife Jane Cruz, Lacson’s media relations officer, was then working in Oreta’s staff. Rivero agreed to help secure Oreta’s endorsement, and struck a hard bargain: he was to be paid P2 million and also hired as contributing editor of Sampana’s new paper. Sampana was to get P1 million.

Rivero later collected P700,000 in check, then P500,000 and another P300,000 in cash as he worked on the endorsement. He was to turn over P500,000 to Sampana, but the latter never got his share. Sampana broke off with Rivero. They consequently attacked each other in the provincial press. Bulacan Senator Blas Ople patched up the rift in Sept. 1999. Sampana’s pal Jun Acot took their photograph and had it published in a newspaper.

In his separate affidavit also executed on Oct. 31, Acot said he met Rivero through Sampana sometime in 1998. He was present early last August when Rivero talked to Sampana about attacking Corpus and Mike Arroyo while he (Rivero) took care of discrediting Joker Arroyo. Acot said Rivero promised Sampana P1 million from Angara and Lacson. To this day, he said, Sampana has not been paid his share of the snow job, which included stealing private documents.

Acot and Sampana confessed to knowing about and being used for Rivero’s extortionate activities. One of these was asking an amateur radio group of Bulacan businessmen to advertise in Rivero’s radio program. It turned out that the radio station never received the ad payments turned over to Rivero. Two other incidents had Rivero asking for money to praise in his radio show businessmen whom he had instructed Sampana to attack in newspapers. Still another was when Rivero became PCSO media consultant early this year. He advised a Bulacan foundation to petition PCSO for a P1-million, but to share half of it with him for his work. Rivero got a P15,000-advance payment for his influence-peddling, but the PCSO disapproved the donation.

* * *

What’s this, New Year in November? Dynamite fishing is going on unabated in Calatagan, Batangas and in Sta. Cruz, Zambales. Explosions can be heard from morning to afternoon. But the shore patrol and mayors’ offices are doing nothing about it.

* * *

You can e-mail comments to [email protected]