Month: September 2006

Jocjoc Bolante must have realized by now that he got the shorter end of the bargain when he agreed to Mike Arroyo’s bright idea for him to seek asylum in the United States instead of coming home to the Philippines and tell the Senate how he diverted the P728 million fertilizer fund to the campaign chest of Gloria Arroyo in the 2004 election.

Bolante has filed with a Wisconsin court a petition for the issuance of the writ of habeas corpus or release from jail. Earlier, he filed for a motion for bail and to strike out the amicus brief filed by the group of lawyer Harry Roque, Jr. of the Institute of International Legal Studies at the University, who submitted documents related to Bolante’s involvement in the fertilizer scam.

Bolante, as we all know,was the Arroyo couple’s most dependable Rotarian next to Efraim Genuino of Pagcor, when he was calling the shots at the Department of Agriculture where he was installed as undersecretary.

Now that the Commission on Elections has dismissed the petition of Malacañang’s Singaw ng Bayan to verify the signatures they had resourcefully gathered to change the Constitution through People’s Initiative, the next battleground is the Supreme Court.

Nobody was actually surprised at the Comelec decision. The Counsels for the Defense of Liberties, one of those who opposed Singaw’s petition, said last week: “According to the game plan of pro-Chacha advocates, Sigaw will file a petition with the Comelec which will immediately dismiss it due to the permanent injunction, so that Sigaw can immediately go up to the Supreme Court. They then expect the Supreme Court to immediately abandon Santiago vs. Comelec and hastily allow the setting of a plebiscite without any opportunity for opposition.”

I saw last Tuesday on “Strictly Politics” election lawyer Leila de Lima say the same thing.