Stop Cebu lawmaker’s reelection bid, Ombudsman asks Comelec

ABELLANOSA

INCUMBENT Cebu City Rep. Rodrigo Abellanosa may be barred from seeking reelection after the Office of the Ombudsman informed the Commission on Elections (Comelec) that he had been perpetually banned from working in the government on charges of grave misconduct in 2014.

In a letter, Deputy Ombudsman for the Visayas Paul Elmer Clemente told Comelec Chair Andres Bautista that the antigraft body meted out the guilty verdict on the lawmaker for the administrative offense when he was still a city councilor.

“[Abellanosa was] dismissed from the service with the necessary penalties of cancellation of eligibility, forfeiture of retirement benefits and perpetual disqualification for reemployment in the government service,” Clemente said in a letter dated Feb. 10, a copy of which was furnished the Inquirer yesterday.

He said Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales had approved the Oct. 24, 2014, resolution which sacked Abellanosa from public office and a subsequent May 6, 2015, order upholding his dismissal.

Conflict of interest

The case against Abellanosa stemmed from a complaint filed by a certain Philip Banguran who had accused him of conflict of interest when two schools, which both listed the lawmaker as “president-trustee,” entered into an agreement on June 29, 2011, with the city government regarding its scholarship program.

The Ombudsman said the schools—Asian College of Technology (ACT) and ACT International Educational Foundation (ACT-IEF)—received some P171 million in scholarship grants and tax reprieve under the Cebu City Government College Scholarship Program.

Scholarship

The educational assistance program provided each scholar P10,000 in tuition fee assistance for every semester and P1,000 in monthly stipend if they would enroll in colleges accredited by the city government.

According to the Ombudsman, Abellanosa was then an incumbent city councilor when he signed documents as representative of ACT and ACT-IEF.

“[The] conflict of interest is obvious,” read a portion of the May 16, 2014, decision signed by Ombudsman graft investigator Jess Vincent dela Pena.

“A public servant must display at all times the highest honesty and integrity for no less than the Constitution mandates the principle that a public office is a public trust,” it added.

It said government officials “must at all times be accountable to the people and serve them with utmost responsibility, integrity, loyalty and efficiency.”

No control

In his defense, Abellanosa maintained that the allegations against him were baseless and that he had no control over the city government which was represented by Mayor Michael Rama and the city council.

The lawmaker also argued that while he was a ranking official of ACT and ACT-IEF, he “did not gain or benefit from the scholarship program.”