MANILA, 4 August 2005 — Philippine legislators yesterday ordered the arrest of a former poll official who has ignored summonses to testify about allegations that he and President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo discussed how to rig last year’s vote.
The House of Representatives issued the arrest order after five committees cited elections commissioner Virgilio Garcillano for contempt for ignoring three summonses to appear before a joint investigation into allegations of electoral fraud, congressional officials said.
“It’s very crucial that we get him,” Rep. Crispin Beltran said of Garcillano. “He holds the key to the elections fraud charges and other allegations. Arroyo’s fate lies in his emergence.”
But Beltran added he doubted law enforcement agencies would arrest a man who could damage Arroyo’s presidency.
The committees also will ask the Bureau of Immigration to issue a “hold” order to keep Garcillano — who has dropped out of sight — from leaving the country, and the Department of Foreign Affairs to cancel his passport and have him repatriated if he already has gone abroad.
The hearings are looking into wiretapped recordings allegedly of Arroyo and Garcillano discussing ways to ensure her victory in the May 2004 election.
‘Secret Dinner’
In a separate Senate hearing on allegations that Arroyo’s husband, son and brother-in-law received kickbacks from illegal gambling, a former presidential palace official testified that an illegal gambling lord turned over money for hotel bills and bribes for election officials to ensure Arroyo’s victory.
Michaelangelo Zuce repeated what he told a news conference Monday: that in January 2004, he attended a “secret dinner” with regional election officials at Arroyo’s La Vista home in Quezon City, where the bribes were distributed by Lilia Pineda, wife of gambling lord Bong Pineda.
He said that Bong Pineda and his ex-boss Joey Rufino, who was palace political liaison officer at that time, were also present during the meeting
Arroyo, the Pinedas, and Rufino had denied Zuce’s claims.
During cross-examination by the senators, Zuce also said he was “paymaster” to election officials during so-called consultations with them.
Zuce also detailed how the special operations started about two years before the 2004 election. He alleged that the Pinedas had coursed through him the cell phone that connected them to Garcillano, the president, and other influential people.
Zuce also said he was forced to come out for fear of his life because he learned that former PNP chief and now Transportation Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane was looking for him.
Zuce also said that he overheard Garcillano’s conversations with Arroyo about manipulating election results.
Zuce said during one meeting in a Manila hotel with regional election officials, he was assigned to hand envelopes containing 17,000 pesos ($300) to each official.
He said the tasks of a “special operations” team headed by Garcillano included persuading election officials to pad Arroyo’s vote totals and trim her opponents’ figures.
At one point, he said, Garcillano showed him a cabinet filled with plastic-wrapped bills, complaining that his 12-million-peso ($214,000) budget was insufficient.
‘Unreliable’
Arroyo spokesman Ignacio Bunye dismissed the allegations.
“There is obviously a concerted effort to throw dirt at the president, with a day-to-day smear plan,” he said.
Testifying after Zuce, a politician from Masbate province in the central Philippines said nobody should believe Zuce because he was a liar.
Charito Abaco, who lost in the 2001 polls by 96 votes, also testified at the Senate hearing yesterday that he paid Zuce 1.5 million pesos in installments after Zuce promised him he could win the protest case he filed at the Commission on Elections.
Abaco said that despite the money he had paid Zuce, he did not win his protest.
Arroyo, embroiled in her worst political crisis since taking power in 2001, faces impeachment for several charges including violating the constitution, betraying public trust, corruption and bribery.
Opposition lawmakers have urged her to resign to avoid a painful Senate trial. Arroyo has apologized for speaking to an election official before she was declared the winner of the May 2004 ballot, but has denied manipulating the count and refused to resign. (Input from Associated Press & Inquirer News Service)
