Officials of Canlaon City are fighting to keep their posts following a November 29 decision of the Sandiganbayan Third Division finding them guilty of one count of violation of R.A. 3019 or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and sentencing them to six to nine years imprisonment with an accessory penalty of perpetual disqualification from holding public office.
Canlaon City Mayor Jimmy Clerigo, Vice Mayor Jose Chubasco Cardenas, City Councilors Diego Santiago, Mamerto Bernil Jr. and City Treasurer Ma. Luisa Luza and six former officials are appealing the case.
Included in the Sandiganbayan ruling were former City Councilors Wagner Bekim Cardenas, Aldin Avila, Roberto Bolo, Amado delos Reyes, Pedro Montero, Hernani Blanco, Edgar Estampador, Eric Suganob and former City Mayor Judith Cardenas, who was found guilty of two counts of violation of R.A. 3019 and sentenced to 12 years imprisonment with the accessory penalty of perpetual disqualification from holding public office.
Defendants Blanco, Estampador and Suganob passed away during the pendency of the case.
The Office of the Ombudsman, which filed a case against the City officials in 2009, accused the said public officials of binding the city government in a grossly disadvantageous contract when it drew a P60 million loan from the Development Bank of the Philippines in 2005 for re-lending to the Canlaon City Employees’ Multi-Purpose Cooperative.
But the prosecutors said the city government obligated to pay not only the full principal amount but all the accruing interests and charges.
The Sandiganbayan found all defendants guilty as charged, noting that none of the accused offered a real defense except to claim that they performed their actions in pursuit of their official functions as local officials.
The Sandiganbayan said that the defendants “offered virtually nothing” when they were required to refute the evidence against them.
The court noted that their connivance was sufficiently established by evidence of the prosecution even without proof that any of the accused profited from the transaction.
“Their individual acts, when taken together as a whole showed that they were acting in concert and cooperating to achieve the same unlawful objective. The contract turned out to be grossly and manifestly disadvantageous to the local government of Canlaon City. There can be no doubt that the accused are guilty as charged,” the court said.
The 20-page decision was penned by Associate Justice Samuel Martires with the concurrence of Presiding Justice Amparo Cabotaje-Tang and Associate Justice Alex Quiroz.
City Secretary Samuel Eleccion told the MetroPost that so far, none of the incumbent City officials named in the Sandiganbayan ruling have been replaced by the Department of Interior and Local Government and that the situation in Canlaon City continues to be normal. (AP)
