Monday, October 30, 2006 Nalzaro: Tolentino’s behavior By Bobby Nalzaro Saksi
IF YOU watch Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) Cebu City Chapter president Alex Tolentino talk in public and on television interviews, you can say he is a true gentleman who cannot break a glass or kill a fly. He is projecting himself in public as soft spoken and an underdog. But in reality he is not. He is a great pretender and with a bad character.
A reliable source told this columnist that last Sept. 19 during the execom meeting of Metro Cebu Water Distirct (MCWD), Tolentino showed his real character. In an unprovoked outburst, he dashed a glass of water to Lazaro Salvacion, corporate planning department manager, following a heated argument. He failed to hit Salvacion and instead hit George Gabriente. He also challenged Salvacion to a fistfight.
Tolentino got mad when some officers of the water district including Salvacion questioned his private practice. Officers and employees of MCWD, a government owned and controlled corporation (GOCC), are mandated to report to office from 8 a.m to 5 p.m from Monday to Friday except on holidays. But Tolentino seldom reports to his office as former head of the firm’s environment water resource department as he was busy in his private practice and IBP commitments especially on his grandstanding on the issue on vigilantism.
A supposed reorganization of MCWD was not immediately implemented because Tolentino never bothered to heed the call of management to attend meetings. In the reorganization, his office was merged to another department, thus losing his position as a manager. He is now in the legal department. He suspects Salvacion was orchestrating the reorganization to ease him out. It was only last Sept. 19 that he attended the meeting and showed his true character before the shocked MCWD officials.
Though, Tolentino apologized to Salvacion, still General Manager Armando Paredes issued a memorandum ordering him to explain in writing his unprofessional conduct. Tolentino even resented Paredes’ memorandum. As I said in my previous column, I think there something wrong with this fellow. What does he think of himself, owner of MCWD?
Is Tolentino allowed to engage in private practice? The law requires that any government lawyer who will engage in private practice should secure first a permit to practice from the appointing authority. Assuming that he has permit to practice, who gave him the clearance? The board or the general manager? And can he be qualified to be elected in the IBP when he is a department head of a GOCC? Can the Ombudsman look into this issue?
