BY JOCELYN MONTEMAYOR

PRESS Secretary Ignacio Bunye yesterday said President Arroyo will not prevent former Planning Secretary Romulo Neri from testifying again in subsequent public hearings by the Senate on the ZTE scandal "in the spirit of the revocation of Executive Order 464."

"In principle, yes (the President will allow Secretary Neri to appear)," he said.

The President early this month revoked the controversial directive, which bars officials of the Executive branch from attending congressional inquiries without her permission.

The Senate is investigating the alleged anomalous national broadband network project which government had awarded to the Chinese firm ZTE Corp.

Neri, in his first appearance at the Senate hearing last September, invoked executive privilege when asked what transpired during his conversations with the President in relation to the P200 million bribery attempt by then Comelec chair Benjamin Abalos Sr.

At the El Shaddai's Palm Sunday Mass, Bro. Mike Velarde urged President Arroyo, who was his guest, to allow Neri to testify in the Senate's inquiry.

When and if Neri appears before the Senate, he will be asked if President Arroyo followed up with him (Neri) regarding the ZTE contract; if she ordered the ZTE contract prioritized; and, what the President said after being told that the Neri was offered a bribe.

Walter Lohman, Heritage Foundation director for Asian Studies Center, said the US government should help the Philippines, one of its allies in the Asia Pacific region, in averting a possible constitutional crisis as a result of the alleged corruption involved in the NBN-ZTE deal.

Lohman said this "massive scandal" has now "driven politics in the Philippines off the rails."