The $329.4-million NBN-ZTE deal has created a political storm with President Arroyo at the center.

October last year when Jose de Venecia III, the son of former Speaker Jose De Venecia Jr., dropped the first bombshell when he implicated First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo in the botched deal. He testified that the First Gentleman has told him to back-off from the project.

De Venecia, head of the Amsterdam Holdings Inc., also alleged that ex- Commission on Elections(COMELEC) chair Benjamin Abalos has bribed him $10-million dollars to withdraw his company's bid for the broadband network.

Commission on Higher Education(CHEd) head Romulo Neri was also summoned by the Senate to shed light on the controversial deal. Neri, chairman of the University of the Philippines Board of Regents, revealed in his testimony last October that he informed the president about the bribe offer. However, the chief executive did nothing.

The former socioeconomic planning secretary also corroborated De Venecia's" bribery allegations against Abalos. "Sec, may 200 ka dito," he said. He added that: "Due to the magnitude of the project, 200 must mean 200 million pesos."

Neri, a magna cum laude graduate of the UP-College of Business Administration, is a family man. He has no family of his own but he funds the education of his nephews and nieces.

When senators asked him about the role of President Arroyo in the scrapped deal, he chilled and hyperventilated. By invoking executive privilege, he successfully evaded the question and ended his testimony.

The political turmoil caused by the failed broadband deal between the government and Zhong Xing Telecommunications Equipment Corp. (ZTE) of China dwindled after Neri's testimony. Events such as the Glorietta and the Batasang Pambansa bombings and the pardon of former President Joseph Estrada caught the nation's eye. The public became oblivious to the NBN-ZTE controversy for a while. The multi-billion peso deal aims to set up an internet-based link among government offices nationwide.

Last year, UP economics professor Raul Fabella said in a forum that the NBN-ZTE deal is not needed because it is not within the government's competence to run. The forum, held at the UP-Center for Integrative and Development Studies, tackled the legal and economic flaws of the broadband project.

Former Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC) Secretary Josefina Lichauco said that due ZTE's substandard proposal,the NBN-ZTE deal has violated Republic Act 7925( Public Telecommunications Act, which supports the development of the Filipino telecommunications industry .

The deal is just one of many shady deals of the Arroyo administration. The president and her lackeys were also implicated on other scandal-ridden projects such as the multi-billion peso South Rail projects, Diosdado Macapagal Blvd., Fertilizer Scam and the P1.3-billion automated vote counting machines. Last February 4, Malacanang moved heaven and earth to prevent a new witness from telling the truth.Deputy Executive Secretary Manuel Gaite, a key ally of the president, allegedly said in a media interview that there are no "legal remedies" to prevent Rodolfo Noel "Jun" Lozada from testifying in the Senate. As a solution, the Arroyo cohorts send the former head of the Philippines Forest Corporation (PFC) to Hong Kong.

Last February 6, Lozada was abducted by government personnel at the airport. After several hours and hundreds of kilometers traversed, Arroyo cohorts turned him over to La Salle Greenhills.

Lozada, an electronics and communications engineer dropped another bombshell that created another political tempest.

President Arroyo maximizes all her powers to remain in Malacanang. Using the pork barrel as a political leverage, the subservient House of Representatives remains loyal to her.

To keep the military loyal, she allocates huge chunk of the national budget for defense and arms spending. Retired generals were also awarded with government positions for their steadfast loyalty to the president.