Arangkada Uban Ni Leo Lastimosa: The Wiretapped Voices

Wednesday, July 06, 2005

The Wiretapped Voices

Posted by Sheila Coronel
PCIJ

AS I write this, the House of Representatives is playing the three-hour tape submitted by former Estrada lawyer Alan Paguia. Contrary to speculations, opposition senators have nothing to worry about. There is nothing in those tapes that implicates them. They are home free — for now. The same, however, cannot be said for some oppositionists running for local posts in Mindanao.

Today the Commission on Elections chairman, Benjamin Abalos, confirmed that during the elections, he got calls from three opposition senatorial candidates — Juan Ponce Enrile, Jamby Madrigal and Jinggoy Estrada. Enrile, who was reelected senator in 2004, admitted that he did speak to the Comelec chair, but only to make sure that his votes were properly counted. Madrigal and Estrada are so far silent.

So far, there have been no apologies for the impropriety of those calls, or of "lapses in judgment." Maybe the intent was to show, as Rep. Pichay has been repeating over and over the last few days, that the President's phone calls to Garcillano were not unusual in our political culture.

But back to The Tape. The one that is playing in the House at the moment is also the same one released by former NBI Director Samuel Ong, and which you can download for free from this site (no need to go through a congressional hearing).

We have identified, with the help of four Comelec personnel and other sources, about two dozen voices on those tapes, and none of them belongs to an opposition senator.

Apart from the president, the First Gentleman and Garcillano himself, the voices we have identified include those of six candidates who ran in 2004, 11 Comelec officials, three political party lawyers and supporters, as well as Garcillano's wife Grace and secretary Ellen Peralta.

In addition, intelligence sources identified for us three of the five ISAFP agents who annotated the tape — that is, these agents, who were most likely the ones also tapping Garcilliano introduced each of the calls by identifying who was in them and the time and date it took place.

We will reveal the identities of all these people later this week, when the special edition of our i Report hits the streets. But for now, the opposition senatorial candidates can rest easy. None of them are included in whatever version of the "Hello Garci" tape. What should give them reason to worry is if Garcillano makes a comeback.

After all, in a June 7 interview with reporters, the Comelec commissioner looked very confident. At that point, he didn't seem worried about any possible investigation of the wiretaps. He wasn't worried about the opposition, either. He said: "I helped many of them, I have many friends among them."

That was a month ago, when the only versions of the conversations that had been made public were those released by Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye. Garcillano didn't yet know that the three-hour recording existed. A few days later, he dropped out of sight.

To help the congressmen make sense of the recording, here is a list of the candidates we identified as having called Garcillano from May 17 to June 18, 2004.

Robert Barbers
Former senator; K4 senatorial candidate May 2004
(Spoke to Garcillano on May 24 17:37; May 25 15:19; May 26 09:11; after May 26 19:50; May 29 15:16; June 3 13:35, 13:37, 13:39, 19:03; June 4 12:05; June 8 12:33; June 14 10:32; referred to in other Garci calls on May 24 16:00; May 25 11:45; June 1, 14:12, 15:07; June 2 10:23, 11:56; June 6 12:03; June 8 12:02, 14:33, 15:33; June 20, 12:08)

Suharto "Teng" Mangudadatu
Rep., lone district, Sultan Kudarat, elected May 2004; believed to be closely associated with First Gentleman Mike Arroyo
(Spoke to Garcillano on June 4 08:32; June 20 12:08 and was referred to in conversations on May 29 09:47; June 6 12:03; June 16 12:57)