Overdue charges

EDITORIAL CARTOON

SOMEHOW, JUSTICE delayed can become justice perverted.

On April 13, 2011, the first criminal charges arising from the so-called fertilizer scam were made official, with the Office of the Ombudsman filing a case against Sorsogon Governor Raul Lee and two of his underlings for the overpriced purchase of over P3-million worth of fertilizer in 2004. The Ombudsman acted on a resolution dated Nov. 24, 2008. It had taken the Ombudsman more than two years to approve it.

Two days later, the Ombudsman ordered that plunder cases be filed against former Agriculture Secretary Luis Ramon Lorenzo and the central figure in the scam, former Agriculture Undersecretary Jocelyn “Joc-Joc” Bolante, and a host of others. It is alleged that some P728 million, allotted for the purchase of fertilizer to help farmers increase their harvests, was diverted and wound up bankrolling the re-election bid of then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and the campaigns of her allies in 2004.

Ever since the scam first came to light, there have been persistent calls for the filing of charges against any and all of the people behind it. Bolante, known to be a close associate of then First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo and whose name has become synonymous with the fertilizer scam itself, ran away from the ensuing investigations conducted by the Senate and House of Representatives by taking refuge in the United States in December 2005. He stayed there until he was deported back to the Philippines by the US government on Oct. 28, 2008.

Meanwhile, Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez was seen to be standing idly by instead of properly investigating the case and filing the appropriate charges. In fact, the fertilizer scam is said to be just one of the highlights on the long list of high-profile corruption scandals—involving millions even billions of pesos—that broke out under the past administration. Gutierrez, an appointee of President Arroyo, is said to have slept on these cases for an inordinate period of time. In fact, as the Ombudsman since 2005, Gutierrez has been blamed for the slowing down of Ombudsman investigations to a glacial pace, leading to a sharp decline in successful prosecutions as well as a sudden uptick in the number of plea bargains, all evidence of a dismal performance.

Shouldn’t this sudden “paroxysm of action” on the part the Ombudsman be a welcome development?

Unfortunately for Gutierrez, it is not to be. And things took a turn for the worse with her when the controversial Garcia plea bargain burst into the open. Already weighed down under the burden of a negative public image, she now finds herself fighting for her professional life. The House of Representatives has called for her impeachment for betrayal of the public trust, precisely because of her dubious overall performance. Her Senate trial starts this coming May.

A defiant Gutierrez has decried the impeachment complaint as baseless and said she will not leave her post until her term ends in 2012. President Aquino, who anchored his 2010 election campaign on an anti-corruption platform, has been reported to have declared that Malacañang is now “at war” with the Ombudsman.

Not surprisingly, people see her real motive in prosecuting Bolante, Lorenzo, Lee et al. as an attempt to save her skin. And she cannot fault the public for looking at her office’s newfound vitality with a skeptical eye. Bayan Muna party-list Representative Neri Colmenares, one of the House leaders in the impeachment charge against Gutierrez may have captured the public cynicism with his reaction to the news of the filing: “The Ombudsman is still trying to obscure the fact that she sat on the case even if her office was pampered with an inordinately high budget, the highest ever among all ombudsmen.”

Under different circumstances, the prosecution of the case of the fertilizer scam could have been viewed as a positive signal heralding the long-hoped-for triumph of law, justice and truth in the case of the fertilizer scam. Sadly, in this instance, it is seen as an attempt to perpetrate more, if not a graver, injustice.