FORMER President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has urged the Supreme Court to immediately resolve her appeal to dismiss her remaining plunder case in the Sandiganbayan, which involves her alleged misuse of P366 million in Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office funds.
In her appeal filed on Thursday, Arroyo, a reelected representative of Pampanga, urged the high court to act on her appeal to dismiss the case via demurrer of evidence.
She made her appeal even as the Sandiganbayan on Friday allowed her to challenge the evidence presented by the prosecution in the graft raps filed against her in connection with the $329-million National Broadband Network-ZTE deal in 2007.
The anti-graft court’s Fourth Division allowed her to file a demurrer within 10 days.
Arroyo said it was necessary to resolve her case after the Office of the Ombudsman recently started investigation on a new complaint for plunder involving PCSO funds, and this time covering the period 2004 to 2007.
“That the institution of the new complaint which involves disbursements of PCSO funds for earlier years hardly suggests that its filing is to vindicate a public wrong,” Mrs. Arroyo said in her motion filed by her lawyer Estelito Mendoza.
“Indeed, in an earlier pleading, the petitioner has stated that, in the light of the arguments now on the records of the case, [petitioner Arroyo] sees the ‘break of dawn’ in the restoration of full restoration of her freedom. The office of the Ombudsman seeks to prolong her nightmare.”
Arroyo asked the high court to resolve her petitions “at the earlier possible opportunity” as she had been in detention since October 2012.
Aside from her petition on demurrer to evidence, she also has two other pending petitions questioning the Sandiganbayan’s decisions upholding the finding of probable cause and denying her bail petition.
A source from the high court revealed that the Arroyo case would be tackled on Tuesday next week. The high court is expected to decide on Arroyo’s plea after receiving the complete records of her plunder case from the Sandiganbayan.
Arroyo recently filed a motion seeking the urgent resolution of her plea for house arrest pending a decision on her bail petition.
She reiterated her plea to be transferred from “hospital arrest” at the Veterans Memorial Medical Center in Quezon City to “house arrest” in her residence at the La Vista Subdivision in the same city.
The former president’s latest appeal came after the high court granted her pleas for several furloughs.
