A former mayor of a city in Cebu and his city treasurer are set to face graft charges before the Sandiganbayan for their alleged involvement in the 2004 fertilizer fund scam.
In a statement, the Office of the Ombudsman indicted for graft former Bogo mayor Celestino Martinez III and his city treasurer Rhett Minguez in connection with the allegedly anomalous implementation of P6 million in fertilizer funds from the Farm Inputs and Farm Implements Program in 2004.
This forms their share of the P728 million fertilizer funds which were said to have been diverted to then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s campaign kitty to pay off favored local officials. The funds were released three months before the 2004 elections.
The Ombudsman said that in May 2004, the municipality of Bogo received P6 million from the Department of Agriculture for the procurement of fertilizers for rice and corn.
But the project was supposedly implemented by the nongovernment organization “Sikap Yaman” despite its nonaccreditation and violation of auditing rules.
The NGO also entered into an undated memorandum of agreement with no stipulations on project cost and time schedule.
Accused Martinez and Minguez also issued undated and unnumbered disbursement vouchers and Allotment and Obligation Slips to process the payment to the NGO.
The NGO also failed to submit an accomplishment report and a list of previous projects it has implemented.
“(T)he P6,000,000 fund was released to Sikap Yaman in one instance, without any indication as to how or when it was supposed to implement the project, and without requiring the Municipality to report, monitor and inspect the project actually accomplished,” the Ombudsman said in its resolution.
Meanwhile, the charges against Sikap Yaman incorporators, Marcelo Balmaceda, Juliet Chan, Nenita Ocenar, Helen Bayugan and Marissa Rugay, were dismissed for lack of probable cause and insufficiency of evidence.
The Ombudsman is beefing up its case on the series of fertilizer fund scam cases especially after the Sandiganbayan found no probable cause to charge for plunder former Agriculture Secretary Luis Lorenzo and Undersecretary Jocelyn “Joc-Joc” Bolante, who were accused of being the perpetrators in the scheme of dealing fertilizer projects with local officials, politicians, and suppliers to criminally amass P265.6 million. IDL
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