House panel chair: 3 more hearings for NBP probe; Sebastian must appear

Oriental Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo Umali on Wednesday said drug convict Jaybee Sebastian should attend in at least one of the three remaining House justice committee hearings on the illegal drug trade inside the national penitentiary.

In an interview with reporters, Umali said Sebastian, who was stabbed Wednesday morning inside the Bilibid but is now in stable condition, should be able to make it to the October 5 resumption of the House inquiry if his injuries are not "debilitating."

"Ano ba iyong injury niya? Kung hindi naman debilitating iyon, he must appear. Kung debilitating iyan and he cannot really come, then probably we can spare him for the next hearing," said Umali.

Apart from October 5, two more hearings have been set by the justice committee for October 6 and 7, or Thursday and Friday next week.

Umali said they set three more hearing days because of the number of witnesses and resource speakers.

During the two days of hearing last week, at least nine witnesses were presented, among them were Rafael Ragos, a former officer-in-charge of the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor); National Bureau of Investigation agent Jovencio Ablen Jr; and inmates Herbert Colanggco, Rodolfo Magleo, Jaime Pacho, Jojo Baligad, Froilan Trestiza and Hans Anton Tan. 

"In a day, we realized we can only cover about three or four [witnesses]. Kapag more than that masyado nang mahaba," said Umali.

The panel chair also said it would probably take the committee a longer time to hear the testimonies of the remaining witnesses.

"Unlike the first nine witnesses na mayroon silang affidavit, dito probably they will have their own story to tell not necessarily in affidavit form. Kaya baka kailangan himayin ito unlike iyong witnesses na may affidavit," he said.

Bending rules

Umali said the House of Representatives recognizes the importance of its inquiry that it decided to "bend" rules just to continue hearings on the matter.

Under the rules, the House suspends committee hearings to give way to the two-week-long plenary deliberations on the national budget. This year, the deliberations for the proposed P3.35 trillion 2017 budget started last September 26 and will end on October 7 with the period of amendments.

"That was the condition imposed upon us [the panel]... We will suspend our rules that we do not conduct hearings during plenary budget deliberations provided that Jaybee will be brought in to testify," said Umali.

"We are bending and suspending our own rules because of the importance of this particular issue and importance of Jaybee Sebastian as a central figure in this inquiry," he added.

Last week's House witnesses tagged Sebastian as being responsible for tapping them into collecting drug money for Senator Leila de Lima's senatorial campaign kitty.

De Lima denied the accusations and would later reveal that Sebastian was the government's asset who was helpful in the conduct of a raid in December 2015 that led to the confiscation of contraband at the NBP and isolation of 19 high-profile inmates. —KBK, GMA News