THE Office of the Ombudsman has indicted former President Benigno Aquino III for usurpation of legislative powers over the use of the controversial Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP).
In the resolution dated May 22 approved by Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales on June 14, the Ombudsman partially granted the motion for reconsideration filed by militant leaders led by Bayan Muna Rep. Carlos Zarate.
The motion sought the reversal of the earlier decision of the Office of the Ombudsman to acquit Aquino of the charges against him over the alleged implementation of DAP in 2011, 2012 and 2013.
The Ombudsman said that the charges against the former President stemmed from the unlawful issuance of National Budget Circular (NBC) No. 541 to implement the DAP involving P72 billion, which authorized the withdrawal of unobligated allotments of agencies with low levels of obligations.
The May 22 resolution stated that “a re-evaluation of the case establishes that the individual actions of respondent Aquino and respondent-movant (former Budget secretary Florencio) Abad showed a joint purpose and design to encroach on the powers of Congress by expanding the meaning of savings to fund programs, activities and projects under the DAP.”
According to the Ombudsman, it has found in the exchange of memoranda between Aquino and Abad that Aquino gave his approval on the requests to pool savings to fund the DAP.
“It is thus clear that respondent-movant Abad sought the approval of respondent Aquino on both the request for authority to pool savings to fund the DAP and the request for omnibus authority to pool savings/unutilized balances," the Ombudsman said.
"In both instances, respondent Aquino knowingly gave his approval. His approval prompted the issuance of NBC 541 which directed the withdrawal of unobligated allotments and unreleased appropriations and their declaration as savings, which is contrary to law,” the Ombudsman added.
In the same resolution, the Ombudsman denied the Motion for Reconsideration filed by Abad, thus affirming his earlier indictment for the same offense.
Although Zarate welcomes the favorable ruling of the Office of the Ombudsman, he said he believes that Aquino and Abad should not be indicted only for usurpation of legislative powers but also for technical malversation.
"We welcome the grant of our motion for reconsideration by the Ombudsman by now indicting ex-Pres. Aquino as among the respondents. However, we believe that Aquino and Abad should not be indicted for the charge of usurpation of legislative power only but they should be indicted as well for technical malversation as both authors and architects of the multibillion presidential pork barrel called DAP," he said.
Zarate said he, along with other petitioners will study other options to make the two accountable. (Keith A. Calayag/SunStar Philippines)