Defense, prosecution can grill Sara’s security officers

MANILA, Philippines —  In a reversal of his previous ruling, Senate impeachment court presiding officer Francis Escudero said he will now allow both the defense and the prosecution to direct and cross-examine Vice President Sara Duterte’s security officers, Colonels Dennis Nolasco and Raymund Dante Lachica, in case they are summoned to the witness stand.

“Several senator-judges have already inquired if we can call Cols. Lachica and Nolasco, and at the proper time, the court said yesterday, the presiding officer said yesterday that we may consider doing that after the defense shall have rested on this article or after the proceedings before we arrive at a decision. We will afford the parties due process by giving both parties, since these are witnesses called by the court itself, we will afford both parties to cross-examine the witness should the court decide to call them,” Escudero said yesterday.

Senator-judges have been prodding the prosecution to present Lachica and Nolasco after they were tagged by special disbursing officer Gina Acosta and Office of the Vice President Assistant Chief of Staff Lemuel Ortonio as the ones who distributed the secret funds to informants of both the OVP and the Department of Education when Duterte was secretary.

VP as witness?

Meanwhile, the House prosecution panel said it intends to call Duterte to the witness stand in her own impeachment trial as it rested its presentation of evidence on alleged misuse of confidential funds under Article 1 of the Articles of Impeachment yesterday.

Private prosecutor Lorna Kapunan said the prosecution would no longer present its remaining 15 witnesses, which she dubbed as “pawns, bishops, castles and horses” in a game of chess, for Article 1, which alleges that the Vice President misused or misappropriated P612.5-million worth of confidential funds.

Kapunan explained that the prosecution’s decision to forgo the remaining witnesses was because the case “has become very clear” and that the testimony so far “elicited very clearly a pattern as one would see a chessboard.”

“All of these pawns and castles and horses and bishops point to only one person, and that accountable person is the Vice President. That’s why, in lieu of presenting 15 other witnesses, we will be presenting the Vice President herself as regards misuse and misappropriation of confidential funds,” Kapunan said.  –  Daphne Galvez, Bella Cariaso, Delon Porcalla, Ghio Ong