Erap hopeful truth in GMA controversies will come out this year

Detained President Joseph Estrada expressed hope yesterday that 2006 will finally shed light on the controversies hounding the Arroyo administration.

Estrada also said he prayed that "this New Year will bring to our people freedom from the bondage of hardship and crisis."

"The truth will set us free — and only the truth will bring peace, justice and prosperity to our people and our country," he said in a statement issued from the Ejercito residence in North Greenhills Subdivision in San Juan where he will be celebrating New Year with his 100-year-old mother, Mary Marcelo-Ejercito.

Estrada, 68, was obviously referring to several unresolved accusations against President Arroyo, including allegations that she cheated her way to the presidency in the May 2004 polls, in which she beat his best friend, the late king of Filipino movies and opposition coalition standard-bearer Fernando Poe Jr.

"I’m hoping that, in 2006, we will finally face the truth that could set us all free," Estrada said. "Only the truth can bring an end to this crisis. We will never triumph as a nation until truth has prevailed."

He also said he wishes that the plunder case against him being tried by the Sandiganbayan will be resolved soon and that he will be given justice, so that he can again extend help to the Filipino masses who are still reeling from poverty.

"Together with all of you, my prayer for the New Year is freedom from poverty, from hunger, from political and economic crisis, and in all aspects of our livelihood," Estrada said in Filipino.

The ousted leader — who is still fighting charges of plunder — will be staying at the Kennedy St. house until 7 a.m. of Jan. 2, after the justices of the Sandiganbayan extended his New Year’s furlough, which was supposed to expire at 5 p.m. today, by 14 more hours.

The magistrates granted the request of the former actor, considering that this may be the last New Year he could spend with his ailing mother, who was hospitalized last month for several ailments.

The Sandiganbayan earlier denied Estrada’s request to extend his Christmas furlough. Estrada was immediately returned to house arrest at his 15-hectare Tanay, Rizal estate on the afternoon of Dec. 25, 2005.