{"id":60499,"date":"2015-09-01T18:35:16","date_gmt":"2015-09-01T10:35:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=60499"},"modified":"2015-09-01T18:35:16","modified_gmt":"2015-09-01T10:35:16","slug":"abad-seeks-exclusion-from-pork-barrel-scam-case-insists-no-basis-on-charges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2015\/09\/01\/abad-seeks-exclusion-from-pork-barrel-scam-case-insists-no-basis-on-charges\/","title":{"rendered":"Abad seeks exclusion from pork barrel scam case, insists no basis on charges"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Budget<\/a>
Budget Secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad (Official photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA \u2013 Budget Secretary Florencio \u201cButch\u201d Abad sought for an exclusion from the P10-billion pork barrel scam case, insisting that Antonio Ortiz\u2019 petition to make him principally liable for the graft charges lacked merit and had no legal and factual bases.<\/p>\n

Ortiz, who was the former director general of the Technology Resource Center (TRC), has been accused in two graft charges in connection with the multi-billion pork barrel scam allegedly perpetuated by businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles.<\/p>\n

Ortiz\u2019 lawyer, Bonifacio Alentajan, sought to make Abad principally responsible for his client\u2019s cases as it was the budget secretary who released the notice of cash allocation (NCA) and special allotment release order (SARO) to Napoles\u2019 bogus foundations and nongovernment organizations.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was [Abad] who released the money. He\u2019s actually the most guilty in this case,\u201d Alentajan told reporters, adding that the secretary was then liable for the purported diversion of the congressional allocations supposedly intended for the poor but was misused in ghost projects and programs.<\/p>\n

Abad\u2019s lawyers, however, quickly opposed the 10-page motion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe decision on who to prosecute is an executive, not a judicial, prerogative\u2026 A policy of non-interference stands insofar as the Ombudsman\u2019s exercise of investigatory and prosecutorial powers is concerned,\u201d the budget secretary\u2019s counsel said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuch independence in the Ombudsman who, beholden to no one, acts as the champion of the people and preserver of the integrity of the public office,\u201d they added.<\/p>\n

Abad\u2019s lawyers then asked the Office of the Ombudsman to deny Ortiz\u2019 petition.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is thus beyond the domain of this Honorable Court to order the Panel of Prosecutors to conduct a preliminary investigation against a person not charged in an information, especially with a pre-determined result, that is, to indict that person in court, as what is being prayed for by accused Ortiz,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the face of the motion, there are no legal and factual bases to conduct a preliminary investigation against Secretary Abad. The motion merely contains bare allegations and conclusions,\u201d they added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA \u2013 Budget Secretary Florencio \u201cButch\u201d Abad sought for an exclusion from the P10-billion pork barrel scam case, insisting that …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":26501,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,16,95,4377],"tags":[249],"class_list":["post-60499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news","category-news-ph","category-public-probe","tag-rewrite","mauthors-cyra-moraleda","mauthors-philippine-canadian-inquirer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60499","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=60499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}