Padaca graft accuser clears Dy family

Former Isabela Governor Grace Padaca. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

REINA MERCEDES, Isabela—The former vice governor, who accused former Isabela Gov. Maria Gracia Cielo Padaca of graft, surfaced this week to clear the influential Dy family of allegations it was behind the charges.

“Without the assistance, persuasion or pressure from any person or entity, I filed the graft case against (Padaca) in 2007 as a taxpaying resident of Isabela and on behalf of the genuine rice farmers … who are the pillars of the country’s rice and food security,” said Santiago Respicio.

Respicio complained to the Office of the Ombudsman in 2007 about a 2006 memorandum of agreement between the Isabela government and the Economic Development for Western Isabela and Northern Luzon Foundation Inc. (Edwinlfi), which was tasked to manage a credit facility for rice farmers using Isabela funds worth P25 million.

Political attack

Last month, the Ombudsman filed graft and malversation charges against Padaca, Vice Mayor Servando Soriano of Roxas town and two other officials of Edwinlfi before the Sandiganbayan.

Padaca is facing arrest from the Sandiganbayan.

Friends and supporters of Padaca had described the charges as a political attack to prevent her from running again in the 2013 elections.

In a statement last week, Gov. Faustino Dy III said his family took no part in pursuing corruption charges against Padaca.

“Who are we to meddle into the case? She (Padaca) has been a close ally of the President (Benigno Aquino III). It means that whoever is the sitting President, the wheel of justice is rolling just like in this criminal case against her. Why is she turning the tables on us?” he said.

“The order for her arrest emanated from the Sandiganbayan and we do not have any hand in that issue,” Dy said.

Also last week, Padaca’s lawyers submitted a petition before the Supreme Court seeking to annul the Ombudsman’s resolutions which pursued the graft and malversation cases against the former governor.

But Respicio said the information supplied by the Isabela agriculture office showed that the memorandum of agreement “did not, in reality, boost rice production, contrary to [claims made by an Isabela mayor] that it made 10 towns big rice-producing areas.”

Edwinlfi’s beneficiaries

Isabela has one million-hectare rice farms in 35 towns and two cities. The province produces a million metric tons of rice each year, second only to the 1.2 million MT of rice produced annually by Nueva Ecija, according to provincial records.

Edwinlfi’s rice program in Isabela’s second district covers 1,220 ha of rice farms, said provincial agriculturist Danilo Tumamao. He said 449 farmers benefited from the foundation’s loans.

Respicio said that compared to the total farm area of the whole province, the total volume of rice produced by Edwinlfi’s beneficiaries could not have “made a dent in the provincial rice output.”

He did not provide figures, although Tumamao on Sunday said the average yield per hectare amounts to 100 to 120 cavans. This means the Edwinlfi’s farmer beneficiaries could produce 146,400 cavans in a year. Villamor Visaya Jr. Inquirer Northern Luzon