Thursday, July 10, 2008 DOJ sides with PAO director
THE justice department has dismissed the complaint lodged against the regional chief of the Public Attorney’s Office (PAO) for the allegedly illegal termination of services of the agency’s lawyers.
Chief Public Attorney Persida Ruedas-Acosta clarified that the lawyers were not fired. Their appointments merely expired and were not renewed. As a result, they have been replaced.
Thelma Chiong, national vice president of the Crusade Against Violence (CAV), filed the complaint against PAO Regional Director Maria G-Ree Calinawan.
Chiong said the termination of the lawyers’ services hampered the schedules of the cases her group is monitoring and described the basis for the dismissal of her complaint as the product of “a play of words.”
Calinawan, in an interview yesterday, said Chiong might have been misinformed. She clarified that no termination took place and that the lawyers’ appointments had terms and that they had expired.
As this developed, the Regional Trial Court (RTC) is expected to release today its ruling on the injunction case filed by a public attorney and a staff member to block their transfer to Barili.
A source from the 11th branch of the Cebu RTC said that Judge Ramon Daomilas Jr. handed down the ruling yesterday but it could not be released pending service to the parties.
The transfer, Atty. Elisa Porio and Mrs. Carmelita Dacanay have said, is motivated by ill will because, like the lawyers whose appointments were not renewed, they signed a petition seeking Calinawan’s transfer from the region.
The other signatories to the petition include lawyers Irene Ann Caballes, Irish Inabangan, Eleanor Tayad, Graciano Espina, Crispulo Abayon III, Marlon Atillo, Rafael Mativo, Christine Ligas, Karen Gonzalez, Desiree Joyce Santiago and Edsel Ensomo.
The four-page petition, dated Feb. 18, 2008, said the assistant public attorneys of the Cebu City Division raised several questions, one of which was Calinawan’s supposed method of controlling the agency’s disbursement of funds.
She supposedly replaced with her confidant an employee who for years had been in charge of the function. This allegedly resulted in funds not reaching the district offices.
They also charged her with issuing disciplinary memoranda on the basis of unsubstantiated information, falsely accusing lawyers of wrongdoing in the presence of their clients, and misconduct.
Calinawan denied both the charges in the petition as well as insinuations she didn’t recommend the renewal of the appointments of the lawyers because they signed it. (KNR)
