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Thursday, October 30, 2003
Ombud scolds Tomas
By Giovannie A. Nilles
Sun.Star Staff Reporter
MAYOR Tomas Osmeña was reprimanded by the Office of the Ombudsman-Visayas for shooing former Barangay Sudlon 2 captain Jessie Jayme out of his office in January last year.
The anti-graft office dismissed the criminal aspect of the case, though, after seeing no evidence to prove that Osmeña caused undue injury to Jayme and his constituents, through bad faith and manifest partiality.
“High strung and belligerent behavior has no place in the government service, where the personnel and employees are enjoined to act with self-restraint and courtesy at all times even when confronted with rudeness and insolence” the decision said, quoting a Supreme Court ruling.
Deputy Ombudsman Primo Miro approved the administrative reprimand and the dismissal of the criminal aspect of the case last Oct. 20.
Graft Investigator Carla Narvios-Tanco agreed in the administrative aspect of the case that Osmeña’s office is not a place where everyone can simply come and go without control.
“For him to be asked to leave without valid reason, such as causing trouble inside, was inappropriate,” the five-page decision said.
Tanco stressed that if Jayme was really uninvited, the mayor could have asked him to leave, but nicely.
“Even if he (Jayme) came uninvited, he is still a person, someone who should be accorded due respect and given the dignity any person ought to be given. If indeed (Jayme’s) presence was not needed in that meeting, he can be shown the way out in a polite manner without demeaning his person,” the ruling further said.
Jayme had accused the mayor of shooing him out of the latter’s office, shouting, “Get out! Get out!” on Jan. 25 last year.
The former village chief said he was inside the mayor’s office to attend the signing of the memorandum of agreement (MOA) between the City Government and Sky Foundation Inc., his barangay being one of the reported beneficiaries of the Knowledge Channel.
Eventually, Barangay Sudlon 2 was removed from the list of beneficiaries and replaced with Sudlon 1.
Osmeña told the anti-graft office that Jan. 25 was not a day of signing but of discussing the contents of the agreement. The MOA, he said, could not be signed that day as the City Council had yet to approve the program.
“He insisted that Sudlon 2 was not and never had been considered as a beneficiary. It was Sudlon 1, which he conveyed to Councilor (Manuel) Legaspi, who just wrote Sudlon. When the matter reached (the local school board), Dr. Leonilo Oliva erroneously wrote Sudlon 2,” the decision cited Osmeña’s counter-affidavit.
The mayor also insisted he did not invite Jayme to his office and that even if Councilor Legaspi invited the barangay official, it was without his (Osmeña’s) consent. He described Jayme as a “gate-crashing interloper.”
The anti-graft office ruled that Osmeña’s actuation “constituted an act which is improper for his stature as the Chief Executive of Cebu City.”
Tanco’s findings were approved by Deputy Ombudsman Miro after a recommendation by Director Virginia Palanca-Santiago.
As for the criminal aspect of the case, Tanco found no evidence to show that Sudlon 2 was already chosen as a beneficiary of the program. She said Osmeña, as chief executive, has the discretion to decide on who will be awarded the project.
“Being such, (Osmeña) could not have taken back what he did not give in the first place. Hence, no undue injury could have been caused to Sudlon 2 students and constituents.”
(October 30, 2003 issue)
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