MANILA, Philippines -- He may be receiving a monthly salary of only about P50,000, but Deputy Executive Secretary Manuel Gaite says he will not hesitate to shell out P500,000 to a person in need -- like whistle-blower Rodolfo Noel “Jun” Lozada Jr.
Gaite on Tuesday portrayed himself as the proverbial Good Samaritan who lent a hand to Lozada, only to discover later that the man had turned against him.
“I believed him, I pitied him,” Gaite said in a statement. “When my wife saw the text [message] and asked me about it, she also felt pity for him and asked if there was any way I could help him.”
Gaite admitted giving P500,000 to Lozada through the latter’s brother Owe, but said that it came from his own pocket. Gaite’s statement included what appeared to be a photocopied receipt signed by Owe Lozada for the P500,000.
“I wish to state that no government fund was used in the money that I gave to Mr. Lozada,” Gaite said.
“It is not true, as claimed by Lozada, that the money I gave him through his brother was meant to prevent him from appearing in the Senate hearing nor make him tell a lie if he appears in the hearing.”
Lozada turned over the sealed envelop containing the money to the Senate blue ribbon committee during Monday’s hearing into the now-scrapped National Broadband Network (NBN) project with China’s ZTE Corp.
“With the way Jun Lozada has twisted my response to his personal appeal, deceived me about his dire circumstances, publicly and repeatedly dragged my name into a controversy I have no personal knowledge about, I regret that my act of compassion for him was taken advantage of, and was used to suit his story,” Gaite said.
Unfortunate
Gaite said it was “unfortunate” that all his efforts to help the former chief executive of Philippine Forest Corp. “have been twisted by him or made to appear as part of a scheme to prevent him from testifying in the Senate hearing on the NBN/ZTE project.”
From the start, he said it was Lozada, through his longtime friend Commission on Higher Education Chair Romulo Neri, who had sought him out for legal advice.
Gaite said that the money he had given to Owe on Feb. 4 was for Lozada’s use during his attendance at a supposed conference in London. Lozada flew to Hong Kong on Jan. 30 and stayed there until Feb. 5.
During the Senate hearing on Feb. 11, Gaite denied Lozada’s claim that he had arranged his travel documents, purchased his ticket and funded his foreign trip.
‘Was he just baiting me?’
Gaite said that Lozada had sent him a text message saying “it was so cold where he was (which I assumed was London), with not even proper winter clothing and running out of funds.”
In a text message purportedly sent by Lozada to Gaite at 2 a.m. of Feb. 3 while he was in Hong Kong, he said: “Hindi ko na po kaya ang ganitong buhay (I can no longer live like this).”
So on Feb. 4, Gaite handed Owe the money.
“The money that I handed over to his brother on Feb. 4 was something that I considered he has to account for when he comes back from London. That is why I asked his brother to sign an acknowledgment receipt, a fact that he sometimes omits in his public statements,” Gaite said.
But Gaite said he was surprised when he learned that Lozada was coming home the following day.
“Did he really need the money or was he just baiting me?” Gaite asked.
Sanctuary fund
Also Tuesday, Sen. Benigno Aquino III said the Association of Major Religious Superiors in the Philippines (AMRSP) had already raised P500,000 in just four days since launching a “sanctuary fund” to bankroll the legal needs of Lozada.
Sen. Francis Pangilinan noted the strong response to the fund-raising effort and the Church call for communal action. “This is a chance for the ordinary citizen to become participants rather than mere spectators in the effort to get at the truth.” With a report from Gil C. Cabacungan Jr.
