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| 'Don't Grant Asylum to Joc-joc' |
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| Sunday, 24 September 2006 | |
 Legal experts here don’t think that the US should keep Bolante; in fact, they are asking the American court to send the former government official back to face corruption charges here. On August 4, professors Merlin Magallona, Raul Pangalangan, Harry Roque Jr., and Romel Regalado Bagares of the University of the Philippines-Institute for International Legal Studies filed a joint amicus brief with the immigration court hearing Bolante’s case in Chicago, Illinois. “It is clear that Mr. Jocelyn I. Bolante does not qualify as a refugee under US law and in-ternational law. Neither has he shown proof of a well-founded fear of persecution on account of his political opinion,” says the brief, a copy of which was provided NEWSBREAK. (Check out the full text in www.newsbreak.com.ph.) The petitioners quoted the findings of the Senate, which conducted a six-month investigation into the diversion of the fertilizer funds to the campaign kitty of President Arroyo: “Undersecretary Bolante is the declared architect. He designed it. He was its brains.” They also told the court that the Senate probe established the “strong probable criminal culpability” of Bolante, in his capacity as then agriculture secretary, and two other department officials. The lawyers argued that under the US Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), only a refugee can seek asylum in America. Bolante, they say, doesn’t fit the law’s definition of a refugee, who is “any person who is outside [his] country…and who is unable or unwilling to return to…that country because of persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion….” Bolante, they say, can’t claim persecution because he once belonged to the ruling party and is, in fact, a recognized close friend of the President and her husband. He was never investigated for any alleged criminal acts before he became embroiled in the corruption scandal. His involvement in the fertilizer scam is well-documented by the Commission on Audit. In a statement released by the Information Bureau of the Communist Party of the Philippines on July 26, 2006, the New People’s Army belied Bolante’ claim that they were plotting to kill him. Given these, the lawyers said, “Bolante, far from being a refugee fleeing political persecution from his home country, is actually a fugitive from justice attempting to use political asylum as a means to escape prosecution on corruption charges…in his country of origin.” INTERACT WITH THIS ARTICLE                |
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| Last Updated ( Sunday, 15 June 2008 ) |
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