Bayan Muna Rep. Teddy Casiño, the principal complainant in the case, said he would suggest to Ombudsman prosecutors that they include De Venecia in their list of witnesses against Arroyo who is now a Pampanga congresswoman. Arroyo is under hospital arrest for electoral sabotage.
Casiño said the former speaker was a participant in the controversial golf game in Shenzhen, China hosted by officers of China’s telecommunications giant ZTE Corp., which was then interested in the government’s national broadband network (NBN) project.
The “principal” participants were then President Arroyo and her husband Jose Miguel, Casiño said.
“JDV (De Venecia) can be asked to verify the details and the context of the golf game and the subsequent luncheon-meeting with ZTE executives,” he added.
In filing graft charges against Arroyo, her husband and former elections chief Benjamin Abalos, the Ombudsman cited the golf game as part of its evidence. A fourth respondent in the graft case, former transportation secretary Leandro Mendoza, was not in the golf game.
The Ombudsman stressed it was wrong for the former president to have played a round of golf and met with ZTE executives in China.
The Arroyo administration awarded the $329-million NBN contract to ZTE Corp. in April 2007 in ceremonies in Boao, China witnessed by Arroyo and Chinese officials. Mendoza signed for the government.
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