News and UpdatesIn the NewsDegamo wins TRO anew

Degamo wins TRO anew

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The Court of Appeals has enjoined the Ombudsman and the Department of Interior & Local Government from dismissing Negros Oriental Gov. Roel Degamo for Grave Misconduct. 

 In a seven-page decision dated Jan. 11, 2018, the Special 19th Division of the Court of Appeals, consisting of Associate Justices Marilyn B. Lagura-Yap, Louis P. Acosta and Edward B. Contreras issued a Writ of Preliminary Injunction  and a 60-day Temporary Restraining Order effective immediately.

The Resolution came out one day after a special raffle on Jan. 10, in view of the inhibitions of Associated Justices Edgardo L. Delos Santos and Pamela Ann Abella Maxino. 

Degamo was ordered dismissed by the Ombudsman late last year, which was announced by the Ombudsman in a press release dated Dec. 7, 2017. This Dismissal Order was implemented by the Department of Interior & Local Government on Dec. 19.

The Ombudsman’s order stemmed from a case filed by former Board Member Melliemoore Saycon over Degamo’s spending Php 10 million in Intelligence Funds in 2013 despite the lack of an appropriation ordinance.

In applying for the Preliminary Injunction and TRO, Degamo said he will “certainly suffer great, irreparable and immeasurable damage, injury and ignominy before the matter can be hear on notice considering that he is the duly elected governor of Negros Oriental whose threatened dismissal will jeopardize and scandalize government service in the province of Negros Oriental.”

Degamo also called the Court’s attention to the fact that the act complained of in this case happened in 2013, the same year he was reelected as governor and that his reelection to office operates as a bar to his removal from office under a new term.

The Court of Appeals agreed with Degamo’s argument and applied the Aguinaldo doctrine. It said that while they are aware of the Supreme Court’s abandonment of the Aguinaldo doctrine, “we are equally aware that the abandonment was prospective in application.”

The Court cited records showing that Degamo relied heavily on the fact that a confidential/intelligence fund is “deemed written in the appropriation ordinance as it is part of the annual investment program and that it is beyond the power of the sanggunian to delete the confidential/intelligence fund in the executive budget and transfer the proposed amount therefore to the newly created Gender and Development item.”

Degamo also claimed he drew the fund in good faith, upon the advice of the Provincial Legal Officer.

However, an apparent factual error in the Resolution may render it unenforceable. 

Twice, the Court of Appeals cited that the Dismissal Order of the Ombudsman was dated March 2, 2017, instead of December 2017.

Board Member Rommel Erames told the MetroPost he intends to raise this matter in a Motion for Certiorari before the Court of Appeals.

For his part, Gov. Mark Macias appealed for calm, and assured that he is ready and willing to relinquish the governorship upon the lawful order from the DILG.

Macias, who was Acting Governor starting Oct. 18 when the Sandiganbayan placed Degamo on a 90-day preventive suspension, was installed Governor by the DILG on Dec. 19, when it implemented the Ombudsman’s dismissal order.

Degamo’s preventive suspension ends on Jan. 17. 

It is uncertain if the DILG will allow Degamo to return to his post, with the error in the Resolution of the Court of Appeals. (MP) 

(Back to MetroPost HOME PAGE)


 

 

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