A GOVERNMENT worker has sued the head of the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) 7 and asked the court to award her over half a million in damages for the attempt to transfer her to another post.
Josefina Daisy Cabo also asked the trial court to stop the transfer pending the resolution of the damages suit, adding that not doing so would cause “great and irreparable damage.”
“The complaint… is meritorious and justified under existing law and jurisprudence. The plaintiff has a clear legal right to be protected,” she said.
Cabo argued that the transfer violated her security of tenure and was done without due process.
“Plaintiff as a permanent and regular employee covered by civil service law has a property right over her employment and she cannot be deprived of that property right without due process,” she said.
Cabo, in her complaint, narrated that DILG 7 Director Pedro Noval, last Jan. 15, ordered her transferred from her post as administrative officer to call center administrator of the agency’s capacity building division.
This, she alleged, was a “demotion and punishment for personal reason.”
She said she filed her “vehement objection” to the transfer, sending Noval a letter dated Jan. 27, but the latter insisted by sending her a “request for confirmation/reassignment of personnel.”
This, she declared, made her feel “harassed, intimidated and oppressed.”
In her suit, Cabo argued that the transfer violates provisions of the Civil Code.
“Without any legal process, defendant denigrated the constitutional rights of the plaintiff, since she was arbitrarily and summarily transferred to another position without due process,” she said.
Moreover, Noval is asking her to “relinquish her property right to her public position, obtained through merit and fitness.”
“Although defendant may claim it as his legal right to impose sanctions or reorganize his office, that right may not be abused,” she said.
In supporting her claim to be paid over half a million, Cabo said Noval’s actuation caused her “loss of dignity and besmirched reputation.
“Every person must, in exercise of his rights and in the performance of his duties, act with justice, give everyone his due and observe honesty and good faith,” she
quoted the Civil Code.