'Cyberwarriors' hit Philippine impeachment trial

Philippine President Joseph Estrada is becoming the target of increasing numbers of cyber-protests through Web sites and and e-mail

In this story: Protest hits the streets RELATED STORIES, SITES

MANILA, Philippines (Reuters) -- They call themselves "cyberwarriors" and mount their war on "the Internet battlefield." Their weapon? The mouse.

In between sending protest e-mail to embattled President Joseph Estrada and his allies, Internet-savvy Filipinos opposed to the former movie actor send a deluge of appeals to the 22 senators sitting as jurors in his impeachment trial with just one message: "Follow your conscience!"

Senate President Aquilino Pimentel Jr. told Reuters that on average, he receives about 60 e-mail messages and 20 text messages on his mobile phone every day.

The motley mix of e-mail senders include teenage students, housewives and professionals from the Philippines, and some from the United States.

Their common message is "that I follow my conscience," Pimentel said. Via mobile phones, the message in the abbreviated form used in the medium, is "Use ur conscience: Convict!"

Pimentel said his mobile rings with torrents of text even when he is sitting through the trial in the Senate session hall.

Pimentel said he reads his e-mail and text messages as much as he possibly can, and whenever possible, replies with "Thank you for your input, please be assured that I will use my conscience on the basis of the evidence."

"I tell them that if there's evidence, I convict. If none, I acquit," Pimentel said.

Prosecutor Eduardo Nachura, a former law college dean, said he receives from six to 10 text messages daily.

The Estrada trial marked its sixth day on Thursday and Nachura said the text messages now ring with praise and encouragement.

But on the trial's first day, on December 7, when the prosecutors were perceived to have performed poorly, the text messages were mostly reprimands. "'What happened? Why?"' the messages asked.

At other times, he said people tipped off prosecutors on leads they could pursue.

At least one group, eLagda.com, has claimed responsibility for part of the e-mail and text barrage. Led by Vicente Romano, an Internet marketing executive, eLagda launched in October a campaign to gather a million e-signatures to pressure Estrada to resign. On Thursday, it reported collecting only 100,000 signatures.

Lagda is the Filipino word for signature.

The eLagda petitioners "have transformed themselves into cyberwarriors, with mice as their weapon and the Internet as their battlefield," a press statement of the group said.

On Thursday, eLagda mounted motorcades from various assembly points in Manila and nearby provinces to move "what started as a purely Internet-based protest... to the streets."

The group said that in major cities of Asia, Europe and North America where there are Filipino communities, similar protests were organized "demanding the resignation of President Estrada and appealing to the senator judges to render a guilty verdict on all the charges."

Estrada faces trial for four articles of impeachment -- bribery, graft and corruption, culpable violation of the Constitution and betrayal of public trust.

Conviction in any one of the charges by 15 of the 22 senators is enough to end his presidency. At least eight senators must vote to acquit.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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