ILOILO CITY—A regional trial court (RTC) has issued warrants of arrest against an editor and a columnist of an Iloilo-based newspaper in connection with a P115-million libel suit filed by Iloilo City Mayor Jed Patrick Mabilog.
But former Iloilo provincial administrator Manuel “Boy” Mejorada, columnist of The News Today (TNT) posted bail of P10,000 before he could be arrested.
His co-accused editor Junep Ocampo said he would post bail in Manila where he was on a business trip.
Judge Gloria Madero of RTC Branch 29 in Iloilo City issued the warrants after the Iloilo City Prosecutor’s Office issued a resolution indicting Ocampo and Mejorada for libel complaint. But the Prosecutor’s Office junked the complaint against a third respondent, TNT publisher Rommel Ynion, for lack of merit.
In a four-page resolution dated February 3, Deputy City Prosecutor Honorio Aragona Jr. said he found the column of Mejorada, which was the subject of the complaint, “libelous and sufficient to hold the respondents liable thereto.”
He said the claim of the respondents that the article was made “in good faith and in pursuit of the public good” needed to be proven in a full-blown trial.
Ocampo was also charged because the article was published with his consent and approval as the newspaper’s editor and general manager.
Ynion was excluded from the charges because as publisher, he had “no role nor participation whatsoever” in the writing of opinion articles, according to Aragona.
In his column published on Nov. 8, 2011, Mejorada accused a foundation connected to Mabilog of alleged irregularities in the spending of donated funds.
Mejorada claimed that the Honest and Accountable Living for a Graft-free Iloilo City Foundation misused P2 million donated by United Parcel Services Foundation in 2007 to conduct an English language competency training program for selected students.
Mejorada also wrote that the implementation of the training program in 2008 was fraudulent because it was implemented by the Pan Pacific Career and Management Institute, which was accredited by the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority to conduct short-term training for call-center agents only but not to conduct English language teaching proficiency.
He had also pointed out that the training school was managed by Victory Educ’l Services Inc. wherein the mayor’s brother Jeffrey Christian Mabilog is the majority stockholder and finance officer.
In his complaint, Mabilog denied the alleged irregularities and called the column “malicious.” He said the column was meant to malign and discredit him and to destroy his reputation.
Mabilog sought P100 million in actual damages, P10 million in moral damages, P5 million in exemplary damages and lawyer’s fee of P100,000.
Mejorada, who also hosts a block-time television program, has written mostly critical stories against Mabilog.