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Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Sellon now permanent as chief fiscal
By Karlon N. Rama
Sun.Star Staff Reporter
For as long as he can remember, Nicolas Sellon wanted to be a priest.
Following the steps of an uncle, the late Msgr. Teofilo Camomot, Sellon entered the seminary at age 16. He learned Latin and earned a degree in philosophy.
But the priesthood wasn’t to be his calling, and he ended up doing something else—walking down the halls of the Palace of Justice and sending criminals to jail.
After 23 years as assistant prosecutor, Sellon now takes the helm at the Cebu City Prosecutor’s Office.
President Arroyo signed Sellon’s appointment last July 5. He will replace Cezar Tajanlangit, who resigned from the post last Feb. 21.
“By virtue hereof, you may qualify and enter upon the performance of the duties of the office, furnishing this office and the Civil Service Commission with copies of your oath of office,” said the appointment that addressed Sellon with the title “Honorable.”
Sellon received the appointment from Regional State Prosecutor Antonio Arellano five minutes before office hours ended yesterday. It came with a letter of transmittal signed by Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita.
The arrival of the appointment was unexpected. Arellano had a meeting with Sellon and Assistant City Prosecutor Fernando Gubalane on the Edgar Damalerio murder case when Arellano’s fax-phone rang.
A veteran prosecutor known for the depth of his knowledge of the law, subordinates in the office welcomed the appointment, saying it signals the start of significant changes in an office bearing a soiled image.
“He is more than a competent prosecutor. He is somebody everybody looks up to. The people in the office will follow him because he has earned it,” one subordinate said.
Sellon is a product of the University of San Carlos College of Law batch 1976. He took the bar immediately after graduation and made his oath as lawyer in 1977.
He started a law office in his hometown of Minglanilla but eventually joined the government as a Cebu City assistant attorney.
He transferred to the Department of Trade, now the Department of Trade and Industry, in 1978 but returned to the Office of the Cebu City Attorney three months after. He stayed there until he got deputized with the Office of the Cebu City prosecutor in 1982.
Sellon received his formal appointment as assistant city prosecutor in June of 1983 and rose from the ranks. He received his first promotion in January of 1987.
“Sa una, lahi. You don’t apply for a promotion. You are informed that you just got one,” he said.
He got promoted again in 2003 and, in 2005, became second in rank to then City prosecutor Tajanlangit.
When Tajanlangit resigned amid allegations of impropriety last February, Sellon became acting office chief.
Born the youngest of eight siblings from public-servant parents, Sellon spent his primary years at the Minglanilla Central School before joining the Seminario Menor de San Carlos in 1968 and then the Seminario Mayor de San Carlos in 1972.
“I saw that I wasn’t destined to become a priest. It’s not a profession that you can get even if you aspire for it. It’s a calling. I was called but I wasn’t chosen,” he said.
He left the seminary with a degree in philosophy but enrolled in a chemical engineering course when he re-joined secular life.
He withdrew his enrollment on the first day of classes after his firth math class and took up law instead.
“It was my father’s passion being the chief of police of Minglanilla. Back in the 1920s, police chiefs prosecuted their own cases in court,” he said.
(July 27, 2005 issue)
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