Palace vs de Venecia: Moving in for the kill

GOTCHA, Published in The Philippine Star, Wednesday, November 28, 2007

An affront from Johnny Enrile is something Joe de Venecia perhaps can comprehend; after all, they never were friends. Sniping by his own pals in the House may not upset him; he knows only too well the petty ambition that drives them. But de Venecia must have been deeply hurt when PCGG chair Camilo Sabio, joined in the Speaker-bashing. Sabio, as most politicos know, is his former minion, so he surely was tempted to ask, like Julius Caesar in fatal ambush, “You too?”

De Venecia was in Iran speaking at the Asia Parliamentary Assembly when Sabio launched the verbal assault. It was a surprise that Sabio talked at all. He’s not known to relish press interviews. Only weeks ago he refused to answer in public a subordinate’s exposé of his huge but illicit allowances from sequestered firms; he simply fired the man. Before that he also evaded the Senate’s televised probe of his agency’s activities, and had to be arrested to face inquisitors. Now Sabio not only is yakking, but is even on the same side with erstwhile foe Enrile in pushing de Venecia to the corner. “He couldn’t have done that without orders from on high,” a congressman close to de Venecia said about Sabio’s sneak attack.

Sabio claimed that de Venecia’s defunct Land Oil Corp. had reneged on $120 million in obligations to the government. The amount supposedly represents a behest loan that the company and its subsidiaries obtained through strongman Ferdinand Marcos. Citing an agreement with the PCGG signed 1988 by a Land Oil officer, Sabio said the group had agreed to repay or else face indictment — which is what he allegedly is doing to de Venecia.

The Speaker’s lawyer Raul Lambino doesn’t “know where this Sabio is coming from.” De Venecia had resigned from Land Oil as far back as 1985. In 1986 right after the People Power Revolt, the company came clean and admitted to having Marcos shares. Still, it was then the biggest Filipino overseas construction and manning operation. Surrendering 45 percent to the PCGG, Land Oil also ceded receivables of $160 million from the Libyan and Kuwaiti governments for huge infrastructure works. Another $50 million in construction and factory equipment were thrown in, though pending recovery from Iraq where these were trapped in the war with Iran (up to 1989) and then the Gulf War (1991-1992). Summing up, Lambino points the PCGG to the UN Claims Commission in Geneva, where Land Oil won a suit for war damages.

The last time the Land Oil issue was brought up was in 1998, when de Venecia was about to run for President. Back then he proved that three PCGG chairmen, the Ombudsman, the Sandiganbayan and the Supreme Court already had cleared him of responsibility for Land Oil’s debts. Why it is being brought up again is traced by both administration and opposition men to Malacañang.

Palace allies are livid that de Venecia’s son Joey III had implicated the First Couple to the infamous ZTE scam. Suspecting that the son did it with the father’s assent, they are plotting to get even with them. Enrile, during Senate hearings, turned the tables on whistleblower Joey and accused the de Venecias of attempting to wrest the telecoms deal from the Chinese firm. He also raked up the Northrail deal that the Senate already had probed in 2005. Rep. Neptali Gonzales Jr. in turn moved at the House to prevent de Venecia from opening pork barrel projects to public scrutiny as a challenge to Gloria Arroyo to lead a moral cleansing. With other congressmen, he threatened de Venecia with ouster should Joey continue to talk bad about the President. And since Joey is unstoppable, the operation is on to topple the five-term Speaker. Sabio’s attack was but a slowpoke contribution to the effort.

Opposition men eagerly anticipate ripening of the oust-de Venecia move. Some of them are enticing him to move over to their side. Others simply want to see the Arroyo-de Venecia partnership crumble.

They’re all in for a surprise. De Venecia is not likely to put up a fight. If he will, he would already have counterattacked Malacañang by now. Already sensing de Venecia’s downfall, advisers whom he had helped put in executive sinecures are abandoning him.

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