De Lima to Ombudsman: Consider resignation an option

MANILA, Philippines—Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez should reflect on calls for her to resign, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said.

While she said that whether to resign or not was up to Gutierrez, De Lima said Gutierrez should consider it “an option.”

“She needs to deeply reflect on it,” De Lima told reporters in an ambush interview.

With the Senate already preparing to try the impeachment case against her, calls were already mounting for her resignation.

Earlier today, former Ombudsman Simeon Marcelo said there was a basis for the impeachment case to push through.

He said ineptness in pursing big cases constitutes betrayal of public trust, which was one of the grounds for impeaching Gutierrez.

“They do not have the focus on the major cases. In the prosecution of major cases, we do not see the enthusiasm or the zeal that we have during that time, with modesty aside, that I and (former) Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio were there at the Office of the Ombudsman,” Marcelo said at a press conference.

“That is a betrayal of public trust [because] under the law, the Ombudsman is required to give priority to these big cases,” Marcelo added.

Complainants in the impeachment case filed against Gutierrez cited the following grounds:

• failed to act promptly on cases filed against former president Arroyo, her husband Jose Miguel Arroyo, and other public officials involved in the botched national broadband network deal;

• incurred inexcusable delay in the investigation on the death of Ensign Philip Pestaño, a case which the United Nations itself rapped the Ombudsman for failure to probe the case;

• failed to investigate the P1-million dinner for the presidential party at the Le Cirque restaurant in New York;

• repeatedly failed to take prompt action on various cases involving the former president such as the Mega-Pacific scam, among others; and

• refused to grant ready access to public records such as the Statement of Assets, Liabilities, and Net Worth of former Pampanga Representative Juan Miguel Arroyo.