NBI sues 11 in DPWH, 2 others for graft

NBI logo over a shot of the facade of its headquarters

CEBU CITY—There’s some hocus-pocus involving 21 dubious signatures and some spurious vouchers, if the accuser in this graft case is to be believed.

The National Bureau of Investigation in Region 7 (Central Visayas) has filed graft charges against 11 officials of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and two private individuals, for allegedly falsifying vouchers to make it appear that certain infrastructure projects were completed on time.

Such paperwork would have allowed the release of funds for those projects and would have spared the private contractor from paying penalties for their delay, according to retired district engineer James Dellosa, who also claimed that his signature was forged at least 21 times in those documents.

Dellosa used to head the 4th District Engineering Office of the DPWH-Region 7 before he retired in February 2020.

‘Signatures falsified’

Acting on his complaint dated July 26, the NBI on Tuesday filed the charges before the Office of the Ombudsman against DPWH engineers Connie Caballo, Amelia Caracut, Erwin Elegino, Edelberto Francisco, Marlon Marollano, Aljoy Orcullo, Jocelyn Orcullo, Noel Pineda, Renult Ricardo and Danilo Villa Jr.; Cecilia Ancajas, who heads the accounting unit of the 4th District Engineering Office; and Eric Ong and Clarita Ugay of private contractor Worldwide Builders.

They were accused of violating Republic Act No. 3019, or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act, as well as Articles 171 (falsification by public officer, employee or notary or ecclesiastic minister) and 172 (falsification by private individual and use of falsified documents) of the Revised Penal Code.

One of the projects cited by Dellosa was the construction in 2019 of the Barangay Kanghalo Multi-Purpose Building in Dumanjug town, southwest of Cebu province.

That P1.8 million project, he said, was not completed within the 90 days stipulated in the contract between the DPWH and Worldwide Builders.

“The expiry date for the project was on September 17, 2019. Dellosa [said] that not only was the project not completed on time but the total work accomplished had not reached 90 percent even beyond his retirement [on] February 7, 2020,” the NBI said in a press statement on Tuesday.

The bureau noted further that “the disbursement vouchers which contained Dellosa’s signatures were falsified and Dellosa did not sign them.”

The Questioned Documents Division of the NBI confirmed the forged signatures.

The bureau also pointed out that the contractor was supposed to pay “liquidated damages” equivalent to 1 percent “of the cost of the unperformed portion [of a given project] for every day of delay.”

Before going to the Ombudsman, the NBI had subpoenaed the DPWH officials as well as Ong and Ugay, who all appeared separately, accompanied by their lawyers, at the bureau’s regional headquarters in Cebu City to deny the charges that would be filed against them. INQ

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