By Ninez Cacho-Olivares
The Daily Tribune
The Daily Tribune
PALACE, DOJ LIST SANITATION ONGOING
Unable to get Janet Lim-Napoles to clean up her list without reduced charges and bail guarantees, a highly reliable source who has linked up with someone in the office of former Sen. Panfilo Lacson, now the Rehabilitation czar, told the Tribune late yesterday afternoon that Lacson has caved in to presidential pressure and has sanitized the list he says he has that was given to him by Jimmy Napoles, the husband of the alleged pork barrel scam brains who is now in hospital.
The Lacson sanitized list which was fed to a major yellow broadsheet contains some 18 names, but the names of Budget Chief Florencio Butch Abad, Senate President Franklin Drilon and Agriculture chief Proceso Alcala no longer appear in the Lacson sanitized list. Also no longer appearing in the Lacson sanitized list are at least three to four allies of President Aquino.
The broadsheet is said to be releasing the sanitized and longer list early next week.
“The reason for the office of Ping Lacson to have released the sanitized list to the newspaper,” the Tribune source said is that the initial list publicized in the Tribune, which came from the Sanitized lacson listNapoles camp and the list that Sandra Cam has which she has vowed to make public should the list be sanitized by De Lima, as well as Napoles’ original list will no longer be seen as credible, as the Lacson-sanitized list that will be published by the major broadsheet will be Lacson’s list, and there may be no need anymore to make a deal with Napoles over her cleansed list and affidavit.
There has also been pressure from the Senate to have the list made public, and with the list of Lacson now sanitized, the Senate blue ribbon panel is now ready to hold a hearing that will highlight the Lacson sanitized list.
The senators, led by Frank Drilon, along with Francis Escudero and Alan Cayetano were already assured by the Palace and De Lima that their names no longer appear in the Lacson list to be presented publicly.
Outside of the cleansing of the names of Abad, Drilon and Alcala, also airbrushed out of the Napoles initial list that was given to Justice chief Leila de Lima, which she had presented to President Aquino, immediately after her having met Napoles in the Makati Hospital before her scheduled hysterectomy and an overian cyst, are Senators Francis “Chiz” Escudero, a valued ally and Alan Peter Cayetano, Manny Villar, among others.
Instead, several other names of former and incumbent senators’ names have been included, namely former Sen. Aquilino “Nene” Pimentel, his son Sen. Koko Pimentel, Sen. Robert Barbers, or his son, as the sanitized Lacson list the source handed Tribune didn’t have a Jr. attached to the Barbers name, Senators Loren Legarda, Miriam Santiago, Tito Sotto, Gregorio Honasan, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, former Sen. Loi Estrada, her son, Sen. Jinggoy Estrada, Senators Juan Ponce-Enrile, Sen. Ramon “Bong” Revilla and his father, former Sen. Ramon Revilla, former Senators Rodolfo Biazon and Ramon “Jun” Magsaysay, and Robert Jaworski. Then congressman now Sen. JV Ejercito was also named in the sanitized list.
Also an addition to the list is former Sen. Tessie Aquino-Oreta.
“Senator Oreta was included to make the list appear as unsanitized,” the source said, adding that she is a relative of the president, “so the sanitized list will look as if no one was spared by (Aquino) since there is already a presidential aunt included in the list.
Also in the original Lacson list was former Senate President Manuel Villar and Alan Cayetano. Their names no longer appear in the sanitized Lacson list.
The initial list of Napoles had Abad, Drilon, Alcala and Escudero and Cayetano and Villar, but their names no longer appear in the sanitized Lacson list that was leaked to the broadsheet for publication.
De Lima has been under pressure to release the Napoles list and she has been refusing to do so since she has been unable to have Napoles sanitize the list without firm guarantee of bail and the pork barrel scam has spun out of control, which is the reason Lacson was said to have been pressured by Aquino and De Lima to release a sanitized list, with four or five in the original list of Napoles excluded.
The sanitized list will be released soon through the broadsheet which the reliable source had leaked to The Tribune, to have it known that the Lacson list has been sanitized and leaked to the pro-Aquino broadsheet, which has only four not too important allies of Aquino and the LPs included, while the majority were opposition figures. Many included in the list have either died, or are former senators.
From the start of meetings between Napoles and De Lima as well as the NBI-DoJ team that has been meeting practically daily with Napoles, to get her to sanitize her list, and for her to focus all attention on the three opposition senators, while not listing down the allies of Aquino and the LPs.
It will be recalled that when Lacson first announced that he had a list of senators and officials who were involved in the pork scam, he merely said there were enough senators to form a quorum, and gave 12 as the number. Lately, he has said that he made a mistake because the senators involved in his list were enough to ratify a treaty, which means 16 or more. The sanitized list covers 17 senators and one congressman, JV Ejercito, completing the family of former President Joseph Estrada, now Mayor of Manila.
Lacson, in his first announcement of the Napoles list said that 12 current and former senators, many congressmen and even Cabinet level officials. He also mentioned officials in the budget department, officials from other departments and a senator who has gotten an even bigger pork barrel kickback compared to the three opposition senators.
None of these names are listed in the Lacson sanitized list.
Lacson said then that there were at least 12 senators. In the House (of Representatives), the list is long. some 100 of them. In the Napoles list, there were names you would expect to be there. There are names there who are known to be noisy and attacking their political foes. There are also those who are quiet. It’s a mix of names. There were names that I had expected, while others that surprised, since their names were never mentioned in the media, based on my information.” This was divulged by Lacson on the sidelines of the Financial Executives of the Philippines general membership meeting then.
Meanwhile, with the allies of Aquino and the LPs the Senate blue ribbon committee assured of their non-inclusion in the sanitized Lacson list, the panel is finally poised to take up the so-called Napoles list in a closed-door meeting on Monday and possibly schedule the reconvening of the panel to scrutinize the document where the purported pork barrel mastermind named the politicians she had transactions with in the past.
Sen. Teofisto “TG” Guingona, chairman of the blue ribbon committee, yesterday announced his plan to call for a caucus on Monday regarding the “list” made by detained businesswoman Napoles.
“Likewise, the blue ribbon committee will begin the hearing of the Malampaya Fund scam,” he added.
Guingona’s announcement came amid the snowballing call among his colleagues pressing for the reopening of the probe on the P10-billion pork barrel scam despite his submission of a draft committee report that is said to be now carrying 10 signatures, just one signature short of the required number of majority of his panel members.
Senator Escudero, on Thursday, reiterated his position in having the said Napoles list disclosed to the public, whether through the blue ribbon committee or otherwise.
“I cannot speak for my other colleagues, my posiition is clear, Make the list public. There is no need to call for a hearing, but not behind closed doors. The list must be made public because the longer it is kept hidden, the more suspicion will arise. What we must remember is that Napoles whose scam was grave, as the public money was stolen. We should also know what is true and what is bogus by way of the baring of the list,” he said.
In the event that the matter will have to be put to a vote, whether during the caucus or in the plenary session, Escudero categorically stated that he will vote to have it publicly disclosed.
With Angie M. Rosales
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