Tourism employees file complaint against Cesar Montano

Tourism Secretary Wanda Teo swears in Cesar Montano as the new Tourism Promotions Board COO in this Dec. 20, 2016, file photo. INQUIRER FILE

Employees of the Tourism Promotions Board (TPB) — a corporate body attached to the Department of Tourism under the supervision of the Tourism Secretary — sent the Presidential Action Center last week a letter of complaint against their chief operating officer Cesar Montano.

The complaint lists down 24 wrongful acts that Montano allegedly committed, including entering into multimillion pesos’ worth of questionable contracts, and hiring his own staff whose functions are redundant with those of incumbent employees.

One of the questionable contracts was TPB’s cash sponsorship worth P16.5 million to a company that handled the production of a rally for President Rodrigo Duterte staged Feb. 25 at the Luneta, attended by people brought in by local government units.

Another was TPB’s cash sponsorship worth P12 million of a concert overseas featuring James Reid and Nadine Lustre.

Montano, an appointee of Duterte, started working as TPB COO only last December 2016.

The Inquirer has made efforts to reach Montano to air his side, but he has not responded. CBB/rga