{"id":229484,"date":"2019-09-04T22:36:42","date_gmt":"2019-09-05T02:36:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=229484"},"modified":"2019-09-04T22:36:42","modified_gmt":"2019-09-05T02:36:42","slug":"panelo-did-nothing-wrong-in-sanchez-clemency-bid-duterte","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/09\/04\/panelo-did-nothing-wrong-in-sanchez-clemency-bid-duterte\/","title":{"rendered":"Panelo did nothing wrong in Sanchez clemency bid: Duterte"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
FILE: President Rodrigo Duterte chats with Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo after the 5th Cabinet meeting in Malaca\u00f1an\u2019s State Dining Room on August 22. KING RODRIGUEZ\/PPD<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0— Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo did nothing wrong when he wrote the Bureau of Pardons and Parole (BPP) a referral letter asking the agency to act on the request for executive clemency for convicted rapist-murderer, former Calauan Mayor Antonio Sanchez, President Rodrigo Duterte said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

In a televised press conference in Malaca\u00f1ang, Duterte said Panelo did not commit any infraction, stressing that it was not his spokesperson\u2019s fault for referring the request Sanchez\u2019s daughter, Marie Antonelvie, to the appropriate agency.<\/p>\n

\u201cYung ginawa ni<\/em>\u00a0Panelo (What Panelo did), it is not his fault\u00a0n<\/em>a lawyer\u00a0siya<\/em>\u00a0(he was their lawyer). You cannot question that. And he happens to be there because I appointed him,\u201d Duterte said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNung dumating sa kanya, ini-refer niya sa<\/em>\u00a0the proper entity.\u00a0Yun nga yun<\/em>g board (When the letter reached him, he referred it to the proper entity. That\u2019s the board). Panelo did not commit any infraction. He happened to be a lawyer at that time,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Duterte pointed out that Panelo, who is also Chief Presidential Legal Counsel, could only have committed wrongdoing if he decided to personally attend to Sanchez family\u2019s request.<\/p>\n

\u201cTama yung ginawa ni<\/em>\u00a0Panelo (What Panelo did is right). Just a referral.\u00a0Ang masama nun kung hinandle niy<\/em>a (What could have been wrong is if he handled it himself),\u201d Duterte said.<\/p>\n

The President said he could vouch for Panelo\u2019s character.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy is there a conflict of interest when he is not called upon to decide?\u00a0Kung sabihing naghingi ng tulong kasi abogado siya noon, anong masama niyan<\/em>(But if you say they asked his help because he used to be their lawyer, what\u2019s wrong with that)?\u201d Duterte said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have full faith in Panelo.\u00a0Hindi ganyan yung tao. Nagkamali kayo<\/em>\u00a0(He\u2019s not that type of person. You\u2019re wrong),\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

S.O.P<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a statement, Panelo defended anew his referral letter to the BPP asking the agency to respond to Sanchez\u2019s daughter\u2019s request describing it as \u201cpurely mechanical or routinary.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe referral of the letter of Ms. Marie Antonelvie J. Sanchez, who happened to be the daughter of Mr. Sanchez, to the BPP is just one of the thousands of referrals the OCPLC has made to various government instrumentalities,\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe letter, just like thousands of letters before it, was simply referred to the appropriate office,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Panelo reiterated that it is standard operating procedure of the Office of the Chief Presidential Legal Counsel (OCPLC) to respond to all letters received by it and refer, and not recommend or endorse, them to the appropriate agency.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccordingly, the OCPLC only refers matters to appropriate agencies which have the resources to verify the relevant facts contained in the letters and the mandate to act on them,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Panelo also pointed out that his office considers inaction on a request received as \u201cnot only as nonfeasance, but also a corrupt practice.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHence so we respond to all, regardless of who we received the letter from. Singling out one connotes partiality in public service, a practice frowned upon by the President and ultimately, punishable by the law,\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are merely fulfilling the commitment of the President to lend an ear to all those who require assistance. And this is what the OCPLC performed when it referred the letter of the daughter of Mr. Sanchez to the BPP. Failing otherwise would mean that we have resorted to discrimination and inaction, which may then subject us from punitive sanction,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\u2018Everything above board\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Panelo said the referral of the letter-request of Sanchez\u2019s daughter to the BPP took away his office\u2019s concern on the request.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt meant that I and the OCPLC did not want to have anything to do with the case of Mr. Sanchez or particularly the request of his daughter for a recommendation on the application for a pardon,\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

Panelo also insisted that meeting the Sanchez family in his office last Feb. 7 was \u201cabove board\u201d because it showed he was not hiding anything.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs Chief Presidential Legal Counsel, I could have directly gone to the President and recommended that Mr. Sanchez be granted executive clemency. I could have even met with the family of Mr. Sanchez somewhere outside the office so the public will be unknowledgeable. These would have been condemnatory,\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy entertaining them in my office and referring their concern to the appropriate body denote that everything is aboveboard and there was nothing clandestine,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Totally different<\/strong><\/p>\n

Panelo said \u201ca simple referral is totally different from a recommendation or an endorsement.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe former does not connote undue interference or intervention while the latter does,\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is inappropriate is if I advised the President as Chief Presidential Legal Counsel to grant an executive clemency to Sanchez, which I did not,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Panelo said he will be filing libel cases against Inquirer.net and Rappler for using the words \u201crecommend\u201d and \u201cendorse\u201d when he simply referred the Sanchez family\u2019s letter to the BPP.<\/p>\n

Panelo said the two online media outlets also failed to comply with his demand for a public apology and rectification.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0— Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo did nothing wrong when he wrote the Bureau of Pardons and Parole (BPP) a referral …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":87474,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,54365,16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-229484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-instagram","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-azer-parrocha","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229484"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229484\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":229489,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229484\/revisions\/229489"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}