FORMER President Benigno S. Aquino III on Monday showed up at the Department of Justice (DOJ) to seek the dismissal of the criminal complaints filed against him and 44 others for their alleged role in the P3.5-billion Dengvaxia vaccine mess.
At the continuation of the preliminary investigation being conducted by a DOJ panel of prosecutors, Aquino along with his corespondents—former Budget Secretary Florencio A. Abad, former Health Secretary Janette L. Garin and several others—submitted their
counter-affidavits on the complaint filed by the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption (VACC) and the Vanguard of the Philippine Constitution Inc. (VPCI).
The VACC and VPCI had accused Aquino and the others of violating Section 3(e) of Republic Act 3019, which prohibits a public officer from giving a private party unwarranted benefits in the discharge of his administrative or judicial functions; Section 65(3) of Republic Act. 9184, or the Government Procurement Reform Act (GPRA); and Article 220 (technical malversation) of the Revised Penal Code (RPC); and Article 365 (criminal negligence) of the RPC.
Besides Aquino, Abad and Garin, several health officials and executives and agents of pharmaceutical companies Zuellig and Sanofi Pasteur, the distributor and manufacturer of the anti-dengue Dengvaxia vaccine, respectively. were also named as respondents.
In his counter-affidavit, Aquino noted the voluminous documents that VACC and VPCI gave to the DOJ panel of prosecutors to support their complaint. Out of these documents, only three documents were relied upon and referenced by the complainants to substantiate their allegation, Aquino noted.
He said the complainants failed to explain the relevance of the documents attached to the complaint, leaving the panel, headed by Senior Assistant State Prosecutor Rossane Balauag, to speculate on their supposed relevance.
Aquino said most documents submitted were full transcripts of testimonies given by witnesses at the Senate investigation on the Dengvaxia mess.
“To be sure, my co-respondents and I cannot be reasonably expected to intelligently and adequately address or even tackle these unidentified documents that were not even referred to or cited in the complaint—when we have not been informed as to how these documents support the charges against us,” Aquino said.
“Complainants’ abject failure to provide sufficient [information] based in fact and law to sustain the offenses charged and a finding of probable cause must and should lead to the outright dismissal of the complainant fled before this Honorable Panel,” he added.
Likewise, Aquino said the complainants may be violating the rule on forum shopping, considering they filed similar cases before the Commission on Elections and the Office of the Ombudsman.
Zuellig, Sanofi
Meanwhile, respondents from Zuellig and Sanofi have yet to submit their counter-affidavits as of Monday. The DOJ gave the VACC and VPCI until June 22 to reply to the counter-affidavits.
In their complaint, the VACC and VPCI insisted that Aquino and the other respondents should be held responsible for “ill-advisedly, thoughtlessly and imprudently” implementing the vaccination program.
The purchase of Dengvaxia was approved by Aquino and Abad even if the program had no allocation in the 2016 national budget, complainants said.
Aquino and his fellow respondents “anomalously and illegally funded and procured the Dengvaxia vaccine and used 830,000 schoolchildren as ‘guinea pigs’ just to bolster the candidacy of Liberal Party presidential bet “Mar Roxas [II] and of other candidates of the party,” they alleged.
At a press briefing after the preliminary investigation, Aquino, Garin and Abad denied any irregularities in the anti-vaccine program during their term.
Aquino insisted that the government’s apparent haste in implementing the Dengvaxia program in April 2016 was to address the rapidly rising number of dengue cases in the country —from 121,580 dengue cases in 2014, the number rose sharply to 200,415 cases.
Aquino also cited Sanofi’s claim that Dengvaxia would be largely beneficial for both those who had dengue before and those who have not been exposed to the illness.
He said they based their judgment on Sanofi’s assurance that only .2 percent are in danger of experiencing severe dengue out of the 830,000 who were given the shots.
Aquino also hinted at political motives behind those pushing the Dengvaxia issue against him.
Also during the briefing, Aquino admitted that he could not think of the possibility that he would suffer the same fate of two staunch critics of President Duterte —Sen. Leila M. de Lima and Chief Justice Maria Lourdes A. Sereno.
De Lima has been detained for what she called trumped-up drug charges, while Sereno was ousted by her colleagues in the Supreme Court based on the quo warranto petition filed by the government’s chief counsel, Solicitor General Jose C. Calida.
“I cannot help but think that it is a possibility,” Aquino said. Still, he expressed optimism the complaints would not prosper for lack of basis.
“At the end of the day the only weapon we have is the truth. And with the truth , with the help of God we will overcome these challenges,” Aquino said.