MANILA, 23 October 2004 — Senators joined the Department of Justice yesterday in asking members of the House of Representatives to conclude their investigation into alleged corruption in the military and leave the job to the civilian and military courts.
Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez told his former colleagues in the House to allow the Office of the Ombudsman and the military court take over the investigation, which the congressmen started last week after state prosecutors filed graft charges against Maj. Gen. Carlos Garcia for unexplained wealth.
Gonzales said the lawmakers should instead focus on how the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) could tighten its rules on procurement and how the Commission on Audit should assess these transactions.
Opposition Senators Juan Ponce Enrile and Panfilo Lacson separately urged the congressmen to leave the matter to the courts, warning that the high profile House investigation was only putting the entire AFP in bad light.
“They should leave the investigation to the court martial so that the guilty will be punished,” said Enrile, who had served as defense secretary under the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos and ex-President Cory Aquino.
Lacson also scoffed at the House probe, saying congressmen probably did not realize that what they were investigating was Garcia’s “version of their own pork barrel.”
“Assuming the allegations against Gen. Garcia were true, that he took commissions from suppliers, what’s the difference between a general receiving commissions and a congressman or a senator receiving commissions from suppliers and contractors? It’s the same banana,” said Lacson, Garcia’s “mistah” (classmate) at the Philippine Military Academy.
Lacson had been very vocal about his opposition against the annual allocation of “pork barrel” funds to lawmakers.
He had given up his own allocation since 2002, saying he saw it as a source of graft and corruption.
Meeting With Commanders
In a bid to dispel fears of unrest among soldiers, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo met with army field commanders over dinner on Thursday and asked them to stick to their jobs.
“She told us not to be distracted by the corruption scandal, to keep focus on our jobs, because reforms are under way to correct structural defects in the organization,” one brigade commander told Reuters yesterday.
The military, which has spawned 14 coup attempts since Marcos was forced out in 1986, set up a special court on Thursday to try Garcia and another two-star general accused of corruption.
The nation’s anti-corruption office says the assets of Garcia, a former military finance manager, appear to be out of line with his salary of about $700 a month.
Garcia and his family had assets and bank deposits worth more than $930,000 in the Philippines and $2 million in the United States, said the Justice Department.
Another major general, Ralph Flores, is accused of altering his records to avoid mandatory retirement at age 56.
The cases have reopened suspicions of rampant graft in the upper ranks but analysts say the government must handle them carefully to avoid fresh rumblings in the military.
Senior officers played down the significance of Arroyo’s two-hour meeting with 40 field commanders.
“There’s no need for a loyalty check,” said Gen. Narciso Abaya, the armed forces’ chief of staff. “I think these reports about destabilization are all part of rumor mongering.”
Cleansing Process
In a speech to the Philippine Air Force yesterday, Abaya said the military justice system was working to resolve the cases of Garcia as well as those of other senior officers being investigated for various offenses.
“The judicial process and the military justice system are in place to resolve the cases to fruition. And our men and women must view these in a positive way. This is an opportunity for the AFP to reclaim its pride and honor in the face of perceptions that we cannot cleanse our own ranks,” Abaya said.
He added that cleansing their ranks “is going to be a long and painful process.”
“But these developments will be the catalysts that shall accelerate the advancement of reforms in the AFP. And all of us must stand together to do away with malpractices that undermine the moral ascendancy of the AFP to be the protector of the people and the state,” Abaya continued.
‘Military Bashing’
Abaya also said that he hoped to convene the court-martial against Garcia before he (Abaya) retires on Oct. 29.
AFP Public Information Office chief Lt. Col. Daniel Lucero said the military had not felt any real rumblings but remained worried about how the issue of corruption was being overblown in the local media.
“A few bad men does not an institution make,” he said.
“Some sentiments among our soldiers are that the manner by which these stories are being projected to the public is interpreted as military bashing,” he added. “Some would go as far as looking at this as an insult or ridicule which is actually destroying the dignity, the honor, the reputation of all members of the armed forces.” (From Inquirer and wire reports)
