Raps vs 3 aides of Cabinet secretary

The Anti-Trapo Movement (ATM) has filed three graft complaints with the Office of the Ombudsman against senior officials of the Office of the Cabinet Secretary, the group said in a statement over the weekend.

A complaint was filed against Executive Assistant Aaron James Veloso and Performance and Projects Management Office Director Ranulfo Sevilla.

Veloso was accused of illegally appointing himself as acting Cabinet secretary from Sept. 28 to 30 last year when Secretary Leoncio Evasco Jr. joined President Duterte’s official visit to Vietnam.

The anticorruption group said Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea only appointed him as officer in charge. Only the President can designate an acting secretary.

Sevilla was accused of violating Section 6 of Executive Order No. 41, series of 1996, when he accepted his position despite the prohibition on active military personnel from assuming any plantilla position in any government agency.

Veloso was also named respondent in a second complaint filed against Cabinet secretary officials for the illegal issuance of his travel authority by Assistant Secretary and Chief of Staff Isabelita Moncano-Somozo.

His alleged trip had no connection with the office’s functions and was supposedly personal in nature. ATM claimed that Veloso “used his close personal relationship” with Somozo for the approval of his travel authority.

A complaint was also filed against Executive Director Gloria Jumamil-Mercado for allegedly irregular expenditures incurred by the Development Academy of the Philippines Graduate School of Public Development Management during her stint as vice president in 2012.