Bulacan city mayor faces plunder rap

SAN JOSE DEL MONTE CITY—The mayor of this Bulacan city and 20 other officials and employees of the city government are facing a plunder complaint over the alleged overpricing in the construction of a government center here.

The July 3 complaint was filed in the Office of the Ombudsman by Councilor Romeo Agapito, who accused Mayor Reynaldo San Pedro, 11 city councilors, nine city government employees and nine private individuals of profiting from the construction of the San Jose del Monte City Government Center.

San Pedro said the project was bid out properly and dismissed the complaint as “politically motivated” and the work of people who wanted to block his candidacy for a third term in 2016. “It’s politics and there is no proof of these accusations,” he told Inquirer on Tuesday.

Work on the government center began in October last year on a four-hectare property in Barangay Dulong Bayan. The project is scheduled to be completed by the end of the year or early 2016.

In a 16-page complaint, Agapito said the officials commissioned Arce Bailon Arce Architects for P14 million to plan and design the project, ignoring plans completed in 2003 during the term of then Mayor Eduardo Roquero. The first plans cost less than P4 million. Carmela Reyes-Estrope, Inquirer Central Luzon