Manila May File Charges Against Marcos

The Philippine government may file criminal charges against deposed President Ferdinand E. Marcos in a bid to persuade the Swiss government to disclose his reported deposits in banks there, a corruption investigator said Wednesday.

Raul Daza, a member of the presidential Commission on Good Government, told reporters that the decision will be made after Jovito R. Salonga, the panel’s chairman, returns from the United States next week. Salonga will carry documents that U.S. Customs agents seized from Marcos when he fled to Hawaii a month ago.

“You might see the commission bring criminal charges (against Marcos) soon after Mr. Salonga returns,” Daza said.

On Tuesday, the Swiss government ordered a freeze on all assets that might belong to Marcos or members of his family. But Daza said Swiss law requires that formal charges be brought against a depositor in his home country before the traditional Swiss secrecy on bank accounts is lifted.

The documents obtained by Salonga reportedly contain sufficient evidence of illegal practices by Marcos to support criminal charges, Daza said. He did not say what evidence might be submitted to the courts here.

Tracking Marcos’ Wealth

The Commission on Good Government, established by President Corazon Aquino, has concentrated on tracking so-called hidden wealth that Marcos, his family and friends allegedly looted from Philippine government funds.

A number of suspect deposits and other assets--Daza placed the value at about $150 million--have been frozen by the Aquino government.

“We have not made a determination on how to dispose of them,” he told reporters.

Daza said another commission member, Ramon Diaz, has obtained a statement from Jose Y. Campos, a longtime Marcos friend and business associate, which reportedly details business dealings he handled for the ousted president. Campos turned over the statement in Vancouver, Canada, Daza said.

He said the government will be lenient with those who voluntarily disclose incriminatory evidence against Marcos, and he indicated that Campos falls into that category. “That probably would explain why we have not taken any action” against Campos’ holdings in the Philippines, Daza noted.

New Charter Assailed

Meanwhile, members of Marcos’ political party here sharply criticized Aquino’s newly proclaimed provisional constitution, which dissolved the National Assembly and left lawmaking powers in her hands. They issued a statement calling the document “a Magna Carta of enslavement.”

The statement was signed by 65 parliamentary members of the New Society Movement, or KBL party. They put off a decision on a plan to reconvene the National Assembly in defiance of the Aquino constitution.

Blas Ople, labor minister in the former regime and head of a breakaway KBL faction, called Aquino’s new powers “more absolute, more authoritarian, more arbitrary than the powers gobbled up by the former president, Mr. Marcos.”

‘Voice of Dissent’

Some members of the Marcos opposition in the assembly--which up to now has supported Aquino’s actions--also criticized the temporary constitution, proclaimed Tuesday. One, Homobono Adaza, said they “were not rebelling against the president but expressing a voice of dissent.”

Adaza said 49 members of the former opposition, nearly four out of five, agreed with his position.

In proclaiming the interim constitution, which will be the law until a new one is written and approved by a plebiscite, Aquino called it a “freedom constitution” and noted that it contains a bill of rights and is subject to judicial review. She said it is a constitution “under which our battered nation can shelter after years of dictatorship in order to heal its wounds, restore its strength and enjoy the first fruits of its new-found freedom.”