Senate throws out report clearing Hanjin, officials

BY DENNIS GADIL

THE joint Senate probe on the Hanjin controversy yesterday threw out the report of the PNP task force Tagovill absolving the Korean shipping firm and Misamis Oriental local officials from charges and counter-charges of bribery and extortion.

"The major people involved were not asked. They (task force) prematurely closed the issue," Sen. Pia Cayetano, chair of the committee on the environment, said after the hearing.

The other committee is the Blue Ribbon chaired by Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano.

She said the task force did not even bother to get the side of Hanjin project manager Guk Hyun Choi.

Choi, she said, was the person mentioned by Tagoloan Mayor Paulino Emano in a television interview who told him that he stood to get P400 million if he allowed the construction of the $2-billion shipyard project despite the lack of environmental compliance certificate.

Emano, in an affidavit he submitted to the task force last week, denied he was bribed. He said he was misquoted.

Cayetano said Emano should explain to the joint panel why he immediately lifted his ban against Hanjin when President Arroyo visited Cagayan de Oro City last April 30

Emano said she told the President about the bribe but she "ignored" him.

Cayetano said the task force report has many "gaps and lapses."

"Were they under pressure to come up with the report?" Cayetano said.

Emano, Villanueva Mayor Juliette Uy and Hanjin president Shim Jeong Sup were no-shows.

Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano took issue with the police’s apparent disinterest in pursuing the bribery issue.

"Just because somebody said there was no bribery doesn’t mean there was no bribery," he said.