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Senator Franklin M. Drilon, having failed to resolve an impasse over who should run as congressman for the lone district of Iloilo City among two top political lieutenants, has chosen youth and loyalty as factors for making a decision on the matter.

Drilon picked lawyer Benjie Gengos, a former city councilor and unsuccessful candidate for vice mayor in the 2004 local elections, to be the official candidate of the Liberal Party to challenge incumbent Rep. Raul Gonzalez, Jr.

Gengos was the original choice of Drilon to be congressional candidate a few weeks ago, with former city mayor Mansueto Malabor supposedly set to recapture his old seat in the City Hall against incumbent Mayor Jerry P. Trenas.

However, Malabor learned about an old jurisprudence prohibiting elected officials who had retired from a certain position from seeking the same office in an election.

Because of this, he proposed that he and Gengos switch places to keep the opposition team intact. Gengos refused.

Several meetings were held in an effort to break the impasse, but the situation went unchanged, and Drilon was forced to step into the fray.

Drilon’s decision effectively split the opposition, with Gengos basically going on his own as LP bet while Malabor becomes the third force in the congressional race.

Former councilor Joshua Alim will run as candidate for city mayor under Malabor’s group.

Officially, Malabor’s group will run under the PDP-Laban party.

The opposition’s two leading figures vying for the congressional nomination to challenge incumbent Rep. Raul Gonzalez, Jr. are still locked in a stalemate over who should run and who should give way.

A breakfast conference hosted by Iloilo governor Niel D. Tupas, Sr. on Monday morning failed to produce positive results as lawyer Benjie Gengos insisted that he is the anointed candidate, hence, should be the official bet for the opposition.

Three-term former city mayor Mansueto Malabor appealed to Gengos to give way as he was forced to reconsider his earlier plan to run for city mayor because of the potential legal problems to be posed by an old jurisprudence that prohibits an elected official who retired from a position from seeking election to the same office.

Present during the meeting were Tupas, former DAR secretary Rene Villa and Iloilo provincial administrator Manuel “Boy” Mejorada.

Malabor had requested that he avoid legal complications by running for the congressional seat instead, and switch positions with Gengos, who had earlier been “anointed” by Senator Franklin M. Drilon as the candidate for congress under the Liberal Party.

“This is my last straw,” said the 75-year old Malabor. “I’m good only for one term.”

Gengos, however, refused to budge. He said the original plan should be followed, and Malabor should run as city mayor.

The problem is that the opposition ticket might break up if Malabor is not allowed to seek the congressional seat.

It was also pointed out that the opposition is headed toward defeat if both Malabor and Gengos file their Certificates of Candidacy (COC) as congressman against Gonzalez.

The council composed of Tupas, Villa and Mejorada will have to elevate the issue to Drilon, who was expected to return from a trip abroad last night, and resolve it before the deadline for filing on March 29.

With just a week left before the deadline for filing of Certificates of Candidacy (COC), the ruling Lakas-CMD and Kampi coalition appear headed for turbulent weather as its leaders wrangled over the choice of their candidate for vice governor.

This came after three Lakas congressmen reached a consensus to field a fierce critic of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo as vice governor in a blatant affront to the declaration of Guimbal mayor Richard Garin that he wanted to run for the position.

On Sunday, these Lakas congressmen held a closed-door meeting at the Sarabia Manor Hotel while Garin was busy campaigning among Iloilo local officials downstairs to seek support for his vice gubernatorial bid.

The proposal to field Rep. Rolex T. Suplico was pushed by TESDA director general Augusto Boboy Syjuco and Rep. Ferjinel Biron to block the political ambitions of Garin, whose father also happens to be a Lakas stalwart and a bitter enemy of Syjuco.

“This is not about Governor Tupas,” said a reliable source who had access to the secret backdoor meeting. “It’s about preventing Garin from getting nominated as candidate for vice governor.”

Garin, however, is not giving up that easy.

In a radio interview Wednesday night, Garin said he would insist on his right as incumbent Lakas member to get first crack at the nomination.

His father, Philippine Coconut Administration head Oscar Garin, also paid an after-office visit on Governor Niel Tupas, Sr. last Tuesday night and asked the sure winner to keep his option open about his running mate.

Tupas had earlier announced the name of Board Member Domingo Oso of Barotac Nuevo as his running mate.

While Suplico enjoys the support of majority of Lakas congressmen, his nomination as candidate for vice governor will not come without pre-conditions.

Rep. Arthur Defensor, Lakas party chairman for Iloilo, said Suplico will have to take his oath as Lakas party member before he is nominated.

This would mean that Suplico will swear allegiance to the President whom he has pounded and pounded with stinging criticism for the last five years.

Suplico confessed this is a very difficult decision to make as it will entail abandoning the principles for which he stood.

There are also observers who believe the Lakas party leadership are giving up on gubernatorial candidate Roberto B. Armada and want to place a strong vice governor candidate who could survive the Tupas juggernaught.

If Suplico wins, then he can mount the same kind of disruptive activities that Armada has been doing during the last six years to the point that he resorted to illegal means to remove Tupas.

The next two or three days should end the jostling and suspense over who will run as vice governor under the umbrella of the Lakas CMD.

In the meantime, Board Member Emmanuel Gallar seems to have been forgotten even though his name was the first to be mentioned as running mate of Armada.

“Gallar is a goner,” said a Lakas insider.

Most likely, Gallar will not even be included in the Lakas ticket for board member, the source said.

The Presidential Anti-Graft Commission (PAGC) has filed administrative charges against TESDA director general Augusto “Boboy” Syjuco and five other top-ranking officials for allegedly allowing a highly-anomalous printing transaction to proceed and blatantly disregarding accounting rules and regulations.

Charged along with Syjuco were deputy director general Santiago M. Yabut Jr., Atty. Marjorie Docdocil, Ma. Lourdes Villanueva, Clifford Paragua and Brenda Furugganan, in their capacities as chairman and members of the Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA).

The case was docketed as PAGC-06-0158-ADM, with the Investigation Office of the PAGC as the nominal complainant.

PAGC chairman Dr. Constancia P. de Guzman ordered Syjuco and the other respondents to file their counter-affidavits to the allegations made by the PAGC Investigation Office within 10 days from their receipt of the charge sheet.

In her four-page complaint, PAGC director for investigation Atty. Mylen H. Gonzales said that Syjuco and his co-respondents failed to exercise their duty to stop an apparently anomalous transaction for the printing of 250,000 copies of the “Salabat for the Filipino Soul II” for P9.2 million.

Gonzales faulted the BAC headed by Yabut for recommending the award of the contract of services to Grand C Graphics after it supposedly conducted a limited source bidding.

That’s because the conditions required for that mode of procurement do not exist, she said.

Moreover, the supposed winning bidder failed to post the required performance security in violation of R.A. 9184, she said.

Despite these glaring irregularities, Syjuco, as head of the procuring entity, even went on to sign the contract of services, although it was well within his authority to declare a “failure of bidding” or not to award the contract.

Gonzales said that Syjuco also “exhibited a blatant disregard for the required accounting rules and regulations.

No less than Syjuco, she said, who facilitated the issuance of the Obligation Slip and approved the document even it lacked the certification of the Budget Chief that would have indicated the availability of appropriation and funds for the purpose.

Syjuco also abused his authority when he facilitated the issuance of the corresponding Disbursement Voucher by signing this document without the required signature of the agency’s accountant, Gonzales said.

These acts of Syjuco “constitute grave misconduct,” she said.
The controversy over the “Salabat” book deal broke out late last year after TESDA employees union SAMAKA-TESDA president Annie Geron exposed the apparent irregularities in the transaction.

In particular, Geron questioned the manner by which the transaction was carried out, especially after it came out in a Commission on Audit (COA) report that all the documents, including the release of the check, were completed in just one day.

Geron has since become the target of harassment by Syjuco, who tried to place her under a 90-day preventive suspension and transferred union officers to other regions as a form of vengeance against those who joined the protest actions.

Geron said the filing of this complaint by the PAGC vindicates her and the union officials.

“We won round one of this fight,” Geron said. “We expect more victories as the PAGC and Ombudsman validates our allegations of corruption against Syjuco.”

Iloilo governor Niel D. Tupas, Sr. (right) gives Police S/Supt. Melvin Mongcal a short list of priority concerns in his program for peace and order when the latter paid a courtesy call to the capitol Tuesday noon, March 20, 2007, as the officer-in-charge of the Iloilo Provincial Police Office (IPPO). Tupas had protested the designation of Mongcal as OIC-PD of Iloilo on account of the latter’s role in the January 17, 2007 Iloilo capitol siege. Mongcal apologized to the governor for what happened, saying that personally, he did not like it to happen that way. He was only following orders, he said. Tupas said he will adopt a stance of “critical collaboration” with Mongcal so that law enforcement will not suffer. He is willing, however, to change his mind about Mongcal depending on the police officer’s performance in the next few weeks.

“Make no mistake about it. I have no left leanings or sympathies,” said Iloilo provincial administrator Manuel “Boy” Mejorada, shown here in a pose with leftist leader Satur Ocampo.

But the arrest of Satur Ocampo raises a lot of questions about the directions this government is taking in trying to end the three decade-old insurgency problem, he said.

“The likes of Norberto Gonzales and Raul Gonzalez are committing stupid mistakes that will only blow fresh wind into the dying embers of the insurgency movement. What they are doing to Satur Ocampo will accomplish just that — arouse more sympathy for the causes that Satur espouses,” he observed.

The best way to disarm communism is allow its leaders to participate in a democratic government, Mejorada said.

The attempt to forcibly bring Satur to Leyte has definitely pushed back the government’s timetable to eliminate this problem, he said.

“Sometimes this leads us to wonder if this is a deliberate attempt to keep the insurgency alive and make the military keep its strong role in the Aquino government,” he said.

Sitting right in the same spot where he had stayed during the Iloilo capitol siege, Governor Niel Tupas (second from left) is a picture of a relaxed and calm leader as he answers questions from a local radio station last Friday shortly after being told of the Court of Appeals decision granting his petition for injunction.

The Court of Appeals 18th Division based in Cebu City has declared as “null and void” an Ombudsman directive for the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) to immediately carry out its penalty of dismissal against Iloilo Governor Niel D. Tupas, Sr. and two board members.
In a 38-page decision penned by Associate Justice Francisco Acosta, the CA ruled that an order of dismissal issued by the Ombudsman is not immediately final and executory as it struck down as contrary to law an implementing rule adopted by the anti-graft agency that would see its decisions carried out at once.

The decision came just two days before the temporary restraining order (TRO) issued by the CA last January 17, 2007 was due to expire.

“This is a triumph of justice and the rule of law,” declared a visibly jubilant Tupas as supporters jumped in glee in the corridors of the Iloilo provincial capitol just before noon last Friday.

The ruling remove any doubts about the legitimacy of the Tupas governorship which the Ombudsman decisions had put into question.

In striking down the power of the Ombudsman to carry out its decisions immediately, the Court of Appeals said the amendments made to its Rules of Procedure to insert that provision was unlawful, as the basic law that created the Ombudsman did not grant that power.

Moreover, the Court of Appeals said the doctrine laid down by the Supreme Court in the case, “Ombudsman vs. Pendatun Laja”, granting the right to appeal to respondents against whom judgment had been made by the Ombudsman was never overturned or reversed.

In the “Laja” case, the Supreme Court made it clear that a respondent is entitled to exercise his or her right to appeal if the penalty imposed is suspension of more than one month or dismissal.

It added that once a respondent files a timely appeal, then the execution of the penalty is effectively stayed until such time that the judgment on the case has become final.

In the case of Governor Tupas, the Ombudsman ordered the DILG to “implement upon receipt” its decision imposing the penalty of dismissal against the local chief executive as well as Board Members Domingo Oso and Cecilia Capadosa.

This phrase “implement upon receipt” was patently illegal and declared “null and void”.

The Court of Appeals affirmed the claim of Governor Tupas that he still had 10 days to file a motion for reconsideration, and if denied, another 15 days to file a petition for review before the Court of Appeals.

The attempt to enforce the decision immediately was unlawful, the appellate court said.

The two decisions in question came out on January 12, 2007, and by Monday, an Undersecretary of the DILG had arrived in Iloilo to implement the order of dismissal.

However, instead of serving Tupas, Oso and Capadosa with certified copies of the decisions, the DILG just sent its regional director to give the local officials an “advanced machine-copy” of the decisions.

And as the “advanced machine copy” was delivered to Governor Tupas, Usec Wencelito Andanar went ahead to administer the oath of office for Vice Governor Roberto Armada and Board Member Emmanuel Gallar.

The Court of Appeals said the swearing into office of Armada was illegal, as there was no vacancy in the position of Governor in the first place.

That’s because the DILG had failed to serve the official copy of the decision on Governor Tupas before Andanar administered the oath of office on Armada.

Iloilo provincial administrator Manuel “Boy” Mejorada had to post a cash bail of P10,000 yesterday, March 15, after police warrant officers served a warrant of arrest after the Quezon City Prosecutors Office filed an information for libel against him based on a complaint of Rep. Judy Syjuco last year.

Mejorada was immediately ordered released by Executive Judge Roger Patricio after posting bail. But he said the arrest warrant will not frighten him into silence about the many anomalies committed by the Syjuco couple involving hundreds of millions of pesos.

Rep. Syjuco had filed the case for libel against Mejorada after the Philippine Daily Inquirer ran a story about the P6.2 million ghost cell phone transaction she had requested from the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) in December 2004.

Mejorada exposed the disappearance of 1,582 units of Nokia 1100 mobile phone units and blamed it on the Syjuco couple after the supposed beneficiary, Sta. Barbara municipal mayor Isabelo Maquino, discovered that his signature on the acknowledgment receipt was forged.

The Syjuco couple had kept quiet about the controversy. They simply weathered the storm of condemnation and behaved as if nothing had happened.

In filing the case for libel, Rep. Syjuco insisted that Mejorada had no business exposing the details of the transaction since the documents in his possession were “mere photocopies”.

She did not categorically deny that the transaction did take place.

The supplier for the cell phones turned out to be a close business associate of TESDA director general Augusto Boboy Syjuco. In fact, Jonathan Ng had become a favored supplier of the Syjucos, as he was also the same supplier for 400 second-hand computers bought with TESDA funds and distributed to barangay captains in the 2nd congressional district.

“This is the sad reality,” Mejorada remarked after his arrest. “The people exposing corrupt practices are the ones arrested while those engaged in stealing public funds are scot-free.”

Mejorada said the Syjucos want to silence those who dare expose their corrupt activities and try to send them to prison rather than answer to the people.

“If they can do this to the provincial administrator, then the ordinary folk in the 2nd congressional district can only tremble in fear as they watch the couple siphon off public funds right before their eyes,” Mejorada said.

But Mejorada said he is unfazed by the service of the warrant of arrest. “It will only strengthen my resolve to keep on fighting for the truth,” he said.

The congressman of the lone district of Iloilo City is the subject of jokes and ridicule in the House of Representatives.

According to a young party-list congressman, this came after Rep. Raul Gonzalez, Jr. narrowly avoided a physical confrontation with opposition legislators who were angered by his “dirty-finger” display during one session.

A group of opposition congressmen were already hunting Raul Jr. outside the session hall of the House of Representatives when the latter was tipped off about this posse’ of angry solons.

Frightened, Raul Jr. ran back to the session hall and took the floor to express his remorse and apology for the ungentlemanly and unparliamentary action.

With trembling voice, Raul Jr. said he wanted to apologize specifically to Rep. Chipeco of Laguna, a young, handsome congressman, as the “dirty finger” was directed at the latter.

“He kept saying, ‘I would like to know if Rep. Chipeco accepts my humble apology,’” said the legislator who relished telling the incident to local political leaders.

Apparently, Raul Jr. had a crush on the handsome congressman from Laguna, the legislator said.

This story seems to gain support from the unusual circumstances of Raul Jr.

For one thing, he is still a bachelor at the age of 45.

He is not known to be fond of women.

When he goes running or swimmng, he is always accompanied by a group of young street kids, with whom he spends almost an hour afterwards in the shower room.

There’s even a proposal that he should support the accreditation of the “Ladlad” as party list, so that he could run under its umbrella in case he loses in the congressional race in Iloilo City on May 14.

This story is a cause for grave embarrassment for the people of Iloilo City.