Ex-Cebu City village chief faces charges

A FORMER village chieftain is facing a criminal offense in court for allegedly falsifying a public document ten years ago.

The Office of the Ombudsman in the Visayas indicted Celerino Cabanca Sr., former barangay captain of Bulacao, Cebu City, on charges of falsification of a public document.

Bail was recommended at P24,000.

Also implicated in the case was former barangay treasurer Juan Monino, who already died.

Cabanca and Monino were accused of conspiring in forging the signatures of some councilors in the Attendance of Bidding.

The two former officials allegedly made it appear that a bidding was conducted for the purchase of medicines amounting to P92,852.80.

However, the councilors said no bidding was conducted by Cabanca and Monino that prompted them to file a complaint against the two former officials before the anti-graft office.

In their counter-affidavit, Cabanca and Monino denied the allegations saying they had no knowledge about the transaction.

Cabanca also claimed that his signature on the document was forged.

Assistant Ombudsman Virginia Palanca-Santiago, however, gave credence to the accusations of the councilors over the denial of Cabanca and Monino.

“If the respondents claimed that their signatures were forged in the documents wherein only their names appeared therein, then who forged their signatures? An outsider?” Santiago said in a memorandum.

“How can an outsider, who is a private person, knew details of the transactions?” she added./REPORTER ADOR VINCENT S. MAYOL