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InterAksyon.com
The online news portal of TV5
MANILA, Philippines – Justice Secretary Leila de Lima has given assurances that suspended Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao governor Zaldy Ampatuan, accused of being a principal in the November 23, 2009 Ampatuan massacre, cannot be freed from detention even if he is accepted as state witness in any case filed over the election fraud that happened in Maguidanao province in 2007.
But a private prosecutor in the massacre case says De Lima’s assurances are empty should Ampatuan be accepted as a state witness and enrolled in her department’s Witness Protection Program.
This is because the law, or more specifically, Republic Act 6981, “An Act Providing for a Witness Protection, Security and Benefit Program and for Other Purposes,” a witness placed under the state’s protection program should be immediately taken to a “secure housing facility” until he or she has finished testifying or “until the threat, intimidation or harassment disappears or is reduced to a manageable or tolerable level.”
“The safe house can be anywhere, it can even be in Forbes Park,” private prosecutor Harry Roque said.
Ampatuan could very well invoke this should he be taken into the WPP for the electoral fraud case since he has publicly pointed to his father, Andal Sr., and brother, Andal Jr., who are also accused principals in the massacre case, of being the real masterminds of the mass murder of 58 persons, including 32 media workers.
Ampatuan is detained at Camp Bagong Diwa in Bicutan, along with the two Andals, another brother, Sajid, and dozens of other co-accused, mainly alleged members of their clan’s huge private militia.
But Roque, who represents the families of several of the 32 journalists who died in the massacre, sees a “grand scheme” unfolding, one intended to benefit not only Zaldy Ampatuan but his kin, too.
He said Friday that the other accused members of the clan could also benefit from the suspended governor’s enrollment in the WPP. Section 8 of RA 6981 states: “When the circumstances warrant, the Witness shall be entitled to relocation and/or change of personal identity at the expense of the Program. This right may be extended to any member of the family of the Witness within the second civil degree of consanguinity or affinity.”
“It’s Zaldy’s game plan,” Roque said, referring to the eventual escape of his kin from prison. “(They) will be spared from Muntinlupa and Bicutan.”
“They will ride into the night and live in his palace forever with impunity,” Roque told InterAksyon.
Ampatuan’s offers to testify in the massacre and electoral fraud cases, and Malacañang’s reactions to these, have stirred suspicions among many quarters that the Aquino administration or, as Roque claimed earlier, at least one faction within the Palace, could be cooking a deal through which the suspended governor would evade being tried for the massacre, in which 58 persons lost their lives. In exchange, he will assist administration efforts to pin down former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on charges of ordering the vote-rigging in 2007. In the light of such scenarios, the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines has warned against “sacrificing justice at the altar of political expediency.”
These suspicions were bolstered on Friday by the sudden surfacing of former Maguindanao election supervisor Lintang Bedol, who has been in hiding for the last four years to evade a warrant for his arrest issued by the Commission on Elections but was interviewed by a television network early this week.
On Friday, Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo, one of the administration officials Roque has accused of “lawyering” for Ampatuan, said Bedol had sent surrender feelers to his department.
While President Benigno Aquino III has categorically shut the door on the possibility of accepting Ampatuan’s offer to become a prosecution witness in the massacre trial, De Lima on Thursday said she is studying the possibility of his turning state witness, along with Bedol, should cases be filed over the 2007 vote rigging.
“That (electoral fraud) is a new case, a totally different case and we can consider them, or whoever, if it is Zaldy Ampatuan or Lintang Bedol (as state witnesses). It would depend on the extent of their participation,” De Lima said.
While she has not said anything about Ampatuan’s enrollment in the WPP, the suspended ARMM governor did make this request when he offered to turn prosecution witness in the massacre trial.
The alleged manipulation of the vote led to a shutout of the then opposition senatorial slate, among them, Aquino.
When news of Ampatuan’s offer to testify in the massacre trial first broke out, De Lima immediately rejected the idea, as did prosecution lawyers, the victims’ families, and media organizations. However, Palace spokesman Edwin Lacierda maintained that the administration needed to assess and evaluate the offer.
This was the position also maintained by Robredo, one of the officials Roque has accused of “lawyering” for Ampatuan, who said on Friday: “Kung merong salaysay, papakinggan, ia-assess yung value, kung ito po ba ay totoo, kung may corroborative evidence (If there is a statement, we will listen, assess its value, if it is true and if there is corroborative evidence).”
He also said even if Ampatuan can no longer turn prosecution witness in the massacre trial, government would continue to provide security for him and his family because “he spoke against his brother and father. There's a possibility that his life will be in danger.”
It was only on Thursday when Aquino, after meeting with Maguindanao Governor Esmael Mangudadatu, who lost a wife and two sisters in the massacre, finally squelched any possibility of Ampatuan’s becoming a prosecution witness in the trial of those accused of the 2009 carnage.
The massacre victims were mostly in a convoy on its way to file the certificate of candidacy of Mangudadatu who was, at the time, planning to run against Andal Jr., then the mayor of Datu Unsay town.
Like Roque, Mangudadatu, too, sees Zaldy’s offer to testify on the election fraud as a ploy to get off the hook on the massacre charges and has asked the government not to take him in as state witness.
The fears that efforts to get Zaldy out of jail are picking up steam shot up several notches when a government doctor recommended to Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes, who is trying those accused of the massacre, that the suspended ARMM governor be admitted to a hospital and evaluated for various illnesses, including heart disease and diabetes.
In the event Ampatuan is taken into the WPP, Roque said there is practically nothing anyone can do to prevent him or, if the “grand scheme” theory is true as well, his kin from leaving detention.
“Under jurisprudence, this is purely executive. The only remedy is if we file a certiorari in court,” he said. (with reports from Joseh Holandes Ubalde and Lorenz Niel Santos, InterAksyon.com, and Maricel Halili and Fritzie Cabial, TV5)
