SC upholds Neri
claim to 'privilege'
Stops Senate from asking 3 questions
BY EVANGELINE DE VERA
VOTING 9-6, the Supreme Court
yesterday ruled that acting Higher Education chair
Romulo Neri correctly invoked executive privilege in
refusing to answer three questions asked by the Senate
in connection with its inquiry into the allegedly
corrupt $329 million national broadband network project
awarded to the China's ZTE Corp.
The tribunal thus granted the
petition of Neri that the Senate be stopped from
compelling him to testify on what he said were
confidential matters, saying doing so would be
detrimental to the country's diplomatic relations with
China.
Penned by Associate Justice Teresita
Leonardo-de Castro, the SC ruling gave weight to the
argument of Neri's lawyer Antonio Bautista that his
conversations with the President "dealt with delicate
and sensitive national security and diplomatic matters
relating to the impact of the bribery scandal involving
high government officials and the possible loss of
confidence of foreign investors and lenders in the
country."
PRESIDENT Arroyo ordered yesterday the revocation of the
licenses and passbooks of all 5,000 National Food
Authority retailers, but gave them the chance of renewing
their permits subject to more strict supervision by the
National Food Authority.
Arroyo also asked traders and retailers
to refrain from raising the prices of their stocks in the
face of a tight supply of the staple and the rising prices
of oil.
The President, at the opening the
National Price Coordinating Council and National Economic
Development Authority-Cabinet Group meeting, said measures
should be strengthened to cushion the impact of the rising
prices of commodities.
Senators yesterday said they were saddened by
the Supreme Court decision upholding Higher Education chairman
Romulo Neri's invocation of executive privilege in the hearings
on the national broadband deal.
"This is unfortunate. We respect the decision
of the SC but it has to be said that those three questions that
magistrates said should not be asked are the same questions that
are left hanging in the people's minds," Senate President Manuel
Villar said.
"(The decision) is a historical blot on the
nation's cherished tenets of democracy, truth and justice," he
said.
