MANDAUE City’s councilors are getting ready to file criminal and administrative complaints, as well as a civil suit, against Mayor Jonas Cortes for ordering city officials to disregard an approved ordinance.
City Administrator Briccio Boholst welcomed the councilors’ move, saying he is confident the councilors will be proven wrong in this issue.
After trading barbs with the mayor through memos and letters, the City Council passed a resolution “condemning in the strongest possible terms the illegal act of Mayor Jonas Cortes.”
What provoked the conflict was Cortes’ order to all city finance officials to pay around 1,300 job-order employees, who had not received their pay since January this year.
Before the mayor’s order, the disbursing officials were bound to wait for the enabling resolution—as required by Section 2 of the budget ordinance—and this delayed the job-order employees’ pay.
The councilors, for their part, were stung by the mayor’s letter-advisory that, in their view, “peddled inaccurate information and outright lies and resorted to name-calling.”
All angles
The letter from the mayor’s camp blamed the council for the delayed pay.
But the councilors nearly lost a vote when they passed the resolution, because Councilor Beethoven Andaya felt uncomfortable filing charges against the mayor. The council accommodated his reservations.
So far, the councilors have not said when they will file charges. Neither does the resolution say what the charges, specifically, will be.
“It is being prepared now and we are looking at all possible legal angles to determine what will suit,” Biaño told reporters.
Under Section 2 of Budget Ordinance 11-2007-428, the council required an enabling resolution for disbursements.
Worse, the Cortes camp and the councilors’ group consulted different annotated versions of the Local Government Code, which added to the confusion.
2 versions
In Vice Mayor Carlo Fortuna’s copy of the code, Section 77 states: “That the local chief executive may employ emergency or casual employees or laborers paid on a daily wage or piecework basis and hired through job orders for local projects authorized by the Sanggunian concerned.”
The version that Boholst used, annotated by Reynaldo Aralar, supplies a different last phrase for Section 77: “...unless authorized by the Civil Service Commission.” City Legal Officer Omar Redula’s copy of the code, annotated by Rufus Rodriguez, also states the same provision as the Aralar version.
“This is already beyond the powers of the city council,” said Boholst, who accused councilors of usurping the powers of the commission.
The City Treasurer’s Office started disbursing P58.92 million for programs and projects, which included one year’s compensation for the job-order employees.
The councilors are now preparing charges against the mayor.
“What we are against here is the disbursement of the salary of people who are working with us,” said Andaya. He admitted he has job-order employees, courtesy of the mayor.
Predicament
Opposition Councilor Emil Rosal said the council is not denying the employees’ salary, “but we have to protect public funds.”
Fortuna called for a brief recess for them to discuss their differences. When they resumed the session, the council passed the resolution, with Andaya’s reservations included.
The final copy of the resolution was not yet available as of press time.
Mandaue isn’t alone in its predicament.
The requirement of an enabling resolution to disburse lump sum appropriations had provoked an argument between the executive and legislative departments at Cebu City Hall about six years ago.
Mayor Tomas Osmeña and the City Council had argued in 2002 on whether the use of an approved P32-million aid for barangays needed council resolutions.
Councilors argued that the power to appropriate lies with the council, but Osmeña rebuked them for “encroaching” on his executive powers.
The Department of Budget and Management eventually ruled in favor of the mayor’s right. It said the disbursements “of local funds must be made in accordance with the approved appropriation ordinance authorizing the annual or supplemental budget without prior approval of the council.” (OCP)
