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IT IS OFFICIAL: The Office of the Ombudsman’s central office will make the decision over the fact-finding investigation conducted by the Visayas Ombudsman over alleged anomalies in the construction of the P800-million Cebu International Convention Center (CICC) in Mandaue City.
Deputy Ombudsman for the Visayas Pelagio Apostol said he has endorsed the case to the central office after he, the three anti-graft investigators who handled the case and reviewing officials could not agree on how to proceed with the case.
“We have decided to forward the case to Manila. We have different recommendations so it will be (the Ombudsman) Manila who will have the final say,” Apostol said.
He said the complaint is scheduled to be delegated to the Preliminary Investigation, Administrative, Adjudication, and Review Bureau (PARB) of the Ombudsman Manila today.
Apostol said PARB, led by Overall Deputy Ombudsman Orlando Casimiro, would review the complaint before resolving the issue.
Apostol remained tight-lipped on the findings of their investigators or their recommendations.
A source from anti-graft office told Cebu Daily News that among the three contradicting recommendations, it was Apostol who went against the recommendation of the investigators.
But now, the decision on what to do next lies with the Ombudsman’s central office: To proceed with a preliminary investigation and administrative adjudication, or to dismiss the case.
Apostol said among the bases for forwarding the case to the central office was a memorandum issued by Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez in June last year, which instructed all regional offices of the Ombudsman to forward to PARB all complaints involving governors or vice governors.
The reason for this was to “further expedite and accelerate the conduct” of investigations involving high-ranking public officials.
The CICC complaint named Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia among its respondents, since the CICC was a project of the Cebu provincial government.
Rory Jon Sepulveda, the Capitol’s consultant on information and revenue generation, said the Capitol did not oppose the transfer of the case to the Ombudsman’s central office.
“We will abide by whatever decision the Ombusdman will come up. We have given anything the Ombudsman requested. We are not hiding anything,” Sepulveda said.
Although the central anti-graft office has been criticized for taking time to resolve complaints, Sepulveda said the Ombudsman might just have been “swamped with a lot of cases.”
He said they believe the anti-graft office is still doing everything regularly as government officials.
Sepulveda said Governor Garcia not bothered by the possibility that the CICC issue might be used against her by her opponents in the 2010 elections.
“The complaint on the CICC has been used by our adversaries since then. If they will use the complaint against us again, then we cannot do anything about it,” Sepulveda said.
