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Sunday, March 07, 2004
Durano defends daughter-mayor on ‘ghost’ project
By Elias O. Baquero
SOGOD Vice Mayor Thaddeus “Deo” Durano yesterday said his daughter Mayor Liza Marie “Moonyeen” Durano has nothing to do with the releases of the P32-million loan from Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) for the town’s waterworks.
Durano said that while they initiated the waterworks project, the bidding was conducted by Land Bank, and all the fund releases passed through the bank and not the Municipality of Sogod.
Durano, a former mayor of Sogod, Cebu is running again for mayor against mayoralty candidate Dean Dosado, who had alleged that the waterworks project in northern town is non-existent.
In a complaint before the Office of the Ombudsman-Visayas, Dosado and nine others accused Moonyeen of using the project, which was supposed to be completed last November yet, to justify the loan from Land Bank.
However, Durano said the only participation of Moonyeen was the signing of loan contract for the waterworks project. Moonyeen signed in behalf of the Sogod Municipality while Gary Teves, the president and chief executive officer of LBP signed in behalf of the bank.
The municipality does not have records of the project because this is being supervised by the bank, Durano further said. He was informed, though, that only 35 percent of the total appropriation has been released by Land Bank directly to the contractor RER Construction.
RER Construction, Durano said, is based in Manila.
“Land Bank has its own engineer who supervises the project and every billing is being scrutinized by the bank. No amount has been released to the municipality contrary to Dosado’s insinuation,” Durano said.
He added that before any release of money, a Land Bank inspector checks the project to see if the contractor’s billing is correct.
(March 7, 2004 issue)
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