Kin wants gov’t to pay for solon’s hospital bills By Maila Ager, Thea Alberto
INQUIRER.net
Last updated 05:48pm (Mla time) 06/04/2007
MANILA, Philippines — Anakpawis Congressman Crispin Beltran is back at the House of Representatives Monday after being detained for over a year following his arrest for alleged rebellion.
Wasting no time, Beltran took the floor to lash out at the government, maintaining his innocence on rebellion charges filed against him and other fellow militant lawmakers.
“I will no longer provide the details of what had happened except for a few points. The first is, I am innocent of the charge of rebellion and second, it is not against the law or a crime to speak against corruption, graft, and the killings of hundreds of innocent civilians,” said Beltran in Filipino.
“It is a bigger crime to remain mute and deaf, indifferent while Filipinos sink deeper, innocent civilians continue to shed blood in the hands of the military,” he said.
Beltran also lamented how this government treated him and his co-respondents in the case like a “criminal and fugitive.”
Aside from rebellion, the lawmaker said they were also charged with murder when what they only did was to use and maximize their parliamentary rights to speak and stand for the people.
He also lamented that because he was in jail, he could not fully help his group, Anakpawis, campaign in the elections last May 14.
Nevertheless, Beltran remained confident that he could sill get the justice and freedom that he had been asking for.
Beltran also used the opportunity to push his pet legislation, House Bill 345, which seeks to give a P125 across-the-board wage increase for private workers, and a separate legislation seeking a P3,000 wage raise for government workers.
And finally, the detained lawmaker concluded his speech expressing his heartfelt gratitude to his colleagues, employees and officials of the House who helped his group fulfilled its commitments to the people, especially those in the marginalized sectors.
At a press conference before the session, Beltran also thanked those who helped him settle his hospital bills, which he said had reached to over P1 million.
A staff member of Beltran disclosed that politicians from both sides of the fence had helped the lawmaker. They were administration Senators Joker Arroyo and Ramon Magsaysay, opposition Senators Manuel Villar and Ma. Consuelo “Jamby” Madrigal, Congressman Roseler Barinaga, and Quezon City Mayor Feliciano Sonny Belmonte.
Beltran arrived at the House an hour before the regular 4 p.m. session. He was accompanied by his fellow partylist representatives — Satur Ocampo, Teodoro Casiño, Joel Virador of Bayan Muna; Liza Maza of Gabriela; and Rafael Mariano also of Anakpawis.
Beltran, who was in a pink barong, proceeded to the office of outgoing House Minority Floor Leader Francis “Chiz” Escudero where a press conference was held, with other opposition members.
But Beltran’s freedom is temporary.
Judge Elmer Almeda of the Makati City regional trial court merely allowed Beltran to leave the Philippine Heart Center in Quezon City to attend the remaining session days of the 13th Congress and the 100th Anniversary of the House of Representatives this week.
Ofelia Beltran-Balleta, Beltran’s daughter, had gone to the national police headquarters in Camp Crame to show the court order by Almeda that allowed his father to attend the sessions that began Monday until June 6, from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m., and which authorities have acknowledged.
Should Beltran need to stay beyond 7 p.m., he would just ask police to allow an extension, Balleta said.
After the session, Beltran will then be brought back to the hospital.
“We are already satisfied at this point that he has been given a pass..since it has been a year since he was detained,” said Balleta whose father was arrested on a rebellion charge in February 2006.
Last Friday, the Supreme Court issued a ruling dismissing the rebellion charges filed against him, Ocampo, Casiño, Virador, Mariano, and Maza.
The case stemmed from the legislators’ alleged conspiracy with the communists in an attempt to topple the Arroyo administration.
Beltran’s co-respondents have prepared a resolution urging the House leadership to support their call for the immediate release of their colleague.
“We ask our colleagues to immediately pass a resolution expressing the sense of the House that Ka Bel [Beltran’s nickname] be immediately released from continuing illegal and arbitrary detention in the light of the Supreme Court ruling and the intrinsic merit of his petition,” Ocampo, Casiño, Mariano, Virador, and Maza said in a joint statement.
At the same press conference earlier on Monday, Ocampo said a resolution by the House would add up to pressures for the immediate release of the detained legislator.
At the very least, Ocampo said the House should help restore the status of Beltran as a lawmaker.
A supplemental motion for Beltran’s release based on the high tribunal decision will also be filed either on Tuesday or Wednesday, lawyer Romulo Capulong announced at the same forum.
“Not only on the basis of the merit of the petition, not only humanitarian grounds but based on the finding of the SC [Supreme Court] itself,” Capulong pointed out.
In the statement, the lawmakers also urged Malacañang to “graciously accept defeat and to respect the decision and prerogatives of high court,” by abandoning its plan to file an appeal on the case.
“There is no use for a motion for reconsideration now, except for the obvious reason that the government wants to heartlessly keep Ka Bel in jail and show its vindictiveness to political dissenters,” they said.
“The Arroyo government has to face the reality that the opposition, including the militant partylist bloc, has a right to exist sans all forms of harassment and intimidation. Otherwise, democracy becomes a farce,” they added.
The lawmakers said it was an outright lie for Malacañang to claim that the high tribunal’s decision had long-term adverse effects on the criminal justice system. It was not only unfair to the High Court but also “doubly unfair “for them, they said.
They said the government simply lost its case because of the “legal shortcuts, violation of due process rights of the accused, and politicized acts of prosecutors.”
Meanwhile, Beltran’s family wants the government to pay the lawmaker’s hospital bills amounting to almost P700,000 after the Supreme Court dropped the rebellion charges against the legislator last Friday, Balleta said.
“Because he has no crime and he should not have been jailed, we demand the government na magbayad ng [to pay] hospital bills at moral damages sa aming [to our] family at kay [and to] Congressman Beltran,” Balleta said.
Balleta said although several senators and lawmakers had offered donations and pledges to pay the bills, she believed that the government should shoulder the charges, which has reached P688,700 as of last week.
She added that the moral damages must amount to P15 million, which meant P1 million for every month that Beltran had been detained.
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