House to get tough on Roxas’ mystery man in Buri mess

THE House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability has threatened to cite in contempt and possibly detain Marlo Dela Cruz, owner of Diamond Pearl Development Corporation, should he continue to disregard lawmakers’ summons in the light of the construction firm’s supply of questionable parts to the Metro Rail Transit 3 (MRT3).

Dela Cruz is an alleged political operator of defeated presidential candidate Manuel “Mar” Roxas and the alleged “mystery man” behind the questionable maintenance service contract entered into by the Department of Transportation (DOTr) and the Busan Universal Rail Inc.

“I welcome this move from the Committee chairman. It’s high time that

we place a lamp on the shady persona of Mr. Dela Cruz. At the very least, he has unwittingly placed the lives of thousands of MRT riders in danger,” Puwersa ng Bayaning Atleta (PBA) Partylist Rep. Jericho Nograles said Wednesday.

Nograles earlier filed House Resolution (HR) No.1212, which has since been taken up by the Good Government panel chaired by Surigao del Sur 2nd district Rep. Johnny Pimentel.

The measure sought an investigation on why Busan Universal Rail Incorporated (BURI), the current maintenance contract provider of the MRT3 has been using fake parts for the 18-year-old train system instead of the original proprietary parts supplied by Bombardier Transportation Signal Ltd.

These questionable parts are supplied by Diamond Pearl to BURI.

Diamond Pearl lawyer Dennis Amparo attended Wednesday’s Committee hearing while Dela Cruz was nowhere to be found.

“After the information given by Busan regarding this inquiry, I was hired by the president, Mr. Wilfredo dela Cruz, to represent them in this case your honor,” Amparo told the House panel. Marlo and Wilfredo are siblings.

Pimentel then approved a motion to issue a subpoena against Dela Cruz, who apparently has a negative reputation at the House of Representatives.

“Inform him that if he does not appear, we will seek a show cause order and eventually cite him for contempt. Because I just learned that Mr. Marlo dela Cruz was invited during the 16th Congress and never appeared during the hearings,” the chairman said.

“So ano po bang tinatago niya? May tinatago po ba siya? If he did not appear in the 16th Congress, then we will compel him to appear in the 17th Congress,” underscored Pimentel. SAGIP Party-List Rep. Rodante Marcoleta made the motion to subpoena Dela Cruz.

The Committee hearing primarily centered on the Vehicle Logic Units (VLU) installed by BURI on the individual cars or coaches of the MRT3 since it took over main- tenance chores of the system in January 2016.

These parts, worth P2 million each, were reportedly sourced from Diamond Pearl.

“The VLU is part of the automatic command and control system of our trains. This system is standard to all modern railways. This is the heart and soul of the safety operations of our trains,” said lawyer Hernando Cabrera, a consultant under the Department of Transportation’s (DOTr) Office of the Undersecretary for Railways.

Cabrera said the automatic command system, which is used by the MRT3’s signaling system, ensures that trains are always at a safe distance between each other. It also prevents over-speeding.

However, he stressed this system is heavily dependent on the reliability and efficiency of the VLU. And there lies the rub.

In his presentation before the panel, Cabrera presented an audit report from Bombardier dated June 7, 2017 saying that the VLUs installed on at least two MRT cars (Nos. 06 and 63) had been “tampered” with.