QC mayor spox on Defensor resignation dare: Stop your dirty kindergarten politics

Spox Pia Roces Morato-spokesperson (left) with QC Mayor Joy Belmonte

MANILA, Philippines — Quezon City’s official spokesperson Pia Morato dismissed the latest “resignation challenge” issued by mayoralty candidate Anak Kalusugan party list Rep. Mike Defensor, and questioned his political maturity in verbalizing such a dare.

Earlier, Defensor announced he is willing to resign as a lawmaker if the Commission on Audit (COA) report questioning the validity of the city’s pandemic food pack procurements is “fake news”. He emphasized that he is standing by his allegations that COA had adverse findings on the use of P479 million given by the national government to the QC-LGU in 2020 as Covid-19 pandemic financial assistance.

To support this, Defensor cited the observation and recommendations portion of the COA 2020 audit report, wherein the agency recommended that QC-LGU submit all necessary documents to confirm validity and regularity of the transactions under question. “If Mayor Joy Belmonte can prove that it is fake news, then I am willing to resign as a member of Congress. If she cannot, then she should resign,” Defensor reiterated.

As verified by several news outlets (including GMA 7 News) and fact-checking initiative tsek.ph, however, Defensor’s allegations were proven inaccurate on several points. In his January 23 statement, for instance, the lawmaker asserted that “in a new report published on the COA website,” state auditors said the Quezon City government’s purchases violated the Procurement Law and its implementing regulations, as well as accounting rules.”

Rather than being a “new report”, however, the COA Annual audit report which Defensor cited was actually published on the agency’s database on July 19, 2021, or seven months ago.

Mayor Joy Belmonte with LGBTQ community in Brgy. Baesa, QC

Moreover, the report did not say it found “violations of procurement laws in the transactions.” In fact, lawyer Resurreccion Quieta, COA’s state auditor for Quezon City, gave the local government unit (LGU) an “unmodified opinion” for 2020, the highest rating the city has received at least in the past 10 years.

Due in part to the ongoing squabble, COA Supervising Auditor and OIC Joseph L. Perez recently issued an official document validating Morato’s claim that QC has indeed submitted all pending documents, and that the city has “substantially complied” with all the requirements of the state auditor.

“I don’t understand why Congressman Defensor is still having difficulty differentiating a recommendation from a reprimand. The COA was simply reminding QC that there were still pending documents at the time the report was being written, which the city duly submitted a few weeks after,” Morato underscored.

“It’s actually so sad that Congressman Defensor has regressed into this version of himself, where he is now issuing childish challenges to a very dignified lady Mayor,” Morato said. “Uso po ito noong nasa kindergarten tayo, away-bata tapos aalis na lang sa playground yung isa. Having said that, he should be careful about issuing a resignation dare, because the facts have already been established, and they are definitely not in his favor,” she added.

“If we wanted to engage in this pettiness, we would have already sent Congressman Defensor the address where he can send his resignation letter,” Morato said. “We have no time for this nonsense, however. Mayor Joy and her city officials are too busy attending to the needs of her constituents, and ensuring that her comprehensive post-pandemic recovery plan and inclusive growth programs are fully implemented,” she concluded.

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