Defiant Gingoyon holds on to position

PROVINCIAL Budget Officer Emme Gingoyon is insisting he is has not been dismissed from service despite the order from Ombudsman dismissing him and two others for their role on the controversial Balili lot case.

In his memorandum to acting Gov. Agnes Magpale, Gingoyon said that he has not personally received the copy of the order.

He also said that DILG provincial chief Jerome Gonzales merely left the order of his dismissal on his table last March 26 as he was on leave that day.

Gingoyon argues that the notice should be served to him personally.

Gingoyon also said that Gonzales is not also the authorized person to serve the order but the Bureau of Local Government and Finance (BLGF), because he is not an employee of the DILG but of the latter.

“A perusal of the decision shows that only the Department of Finance was authorized by the Office of the Ombudsman to make the implementation. Without the sanction of the Office of the Ombudsman, DOF’s referral for implementation to DILG was therefore unauthorized. And the consequent service of the decision by Gonzales was without legal sanction as undersigned Budget officer is not within the jurisdiction of the DILG,” he said in his memorandum dated March 27.

Gingoyon is on leave from March 26 – April 11.

Provincial Human Resource Office has not received copies of suspension order for Gingoyon and Provincial Assistant Engineer Eulogio Pelayre.

Gingoyon and Pelayre have been meted dismissal for their role in the irregular purchase of the 24-hectare Balili lot in Naga City which turned out to be mostly underwater in 2008.

Suspended Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia’s dismissal in the case has been mooted by her subsequent election in 2010. The Ombudsman cited the Aguinaldo Doctrine that extinguishes a public official’s administrative liability if subsequently elected to office.