Pay delay hits more Makati gov’t workers

About 60 more employees of the Makati City government have suffered delays in the release of their salaries due to the leadership dispute between Mayor Jejomar Erwin Binay Jr. and Vice Mayor Romulo Peña, officials allied with Binay said Friday.

The employees, who report to the Office of the Vice Mayor (OVM), found themselves in the same situation with the 17 city councilors and their staff members who did not get paid on Wednesday, according to Acting City Administrator Vissia Marie Aldon.

This is because Peña, who had taken his oath as acting mayor after Binay was ordered suspended by the Ombudsman over corruption charges two weeks ago, had also declined to sign OVM payrolls as the vice mayor, Aldon said Friday.

Three hours after Peña’s oath-taking, Binay obtained a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the suspension from the Court of Appeals. He has refused to leave his office even as Peña put up his own desk as acting mayor in the old City Hall.

Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to stop the TRO issued by the appellate court.

Aldo maintained that “in willfully refusing to carry out his obligation to sign documents necessary for the disbursement of salaries to these employees, the vice mayor is causing undue misery to [the 62 OVM employees] and their families.”

His refusal to sign payrolls of the OVM and the city council could make him liable for “dereliction of duty and grave misconduct,’’ she said.

Joey Salgado, spokesperson for the Binays, said Peña also didn’t sign OVM payrolls for the first half of April.

Reached for comment, Peña stood by his earlier position, saying he was only being guided by the Department of the Interior and Local Government which recognizes him as the acting mayor. “I have to be consistent,” he said.

He said he had already talked with OVM employees affected by the standoff and “they said it was OK. They will support me. They said they did not see any problem because they understood the predicament.”

Meanwhile, as the City Hall stalemate dragged on, Binay signed two ordinances approved by the council in a recent session where Peña was a no-show.

One of the ordinances raised the monthly allowance of the local probation chief and parole officer from P1,500 to P8,000; the other allocated P1,070,000 as additional budget for a proposed network cabling project of the local government’s accounting unit.