A BEAUTY queen and her boyfriend were arrested after they were caught swimming and drinking beer at Panagsama Beach Resort in Moalboal town, southwestern Cebu on Sunday afternoon, May 10, 2020.
Maria Sesaldo Gigante, 26, who was crowned the 2017 Binibining Cebu, and Spanish national Javier Filosa, 35, were brought to the Moalboal Police Station.
Moalboal police said Gigante and Filosa were advised at a police checkpoint not to go to Moalboal as swimming has been prohibited due to the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) which was imposed to prevent the spread of Covid-19 in the province of Cebu.
Gigante and Filosa told police they were going to Alegria town to distribute relief assistance. They were, however, caught drinking while enjoying the beach around 5:30 p.m. on May 10 in Moalboal.
Police said Gigante and Filosa will face charges for disobedience to person in authority and violation of the ECQ and executive order issued by Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia. Both are bailable offfenses.
Garcia said: “The mayor and chief of police of Moalboal were the ones who filed charges against Gigante and Castro. They are the best persons to know what happened and they were caught in flagrante. We will just focus on how they were able to pass the border checkpoints and I would hope that we can get an investigation on when they have passed the checkpoints, border and the dates so that we can ask the assigned teams.”
She also pointed out that under Executive Order 5-Q, only the congressmen from the Province of Cebu and the independent cities of Cebu and Lapu-Lapu are allowed entry into the province.
Gigante claimed that she was asked by a partylist representative to survey which local government units in the province need relief assistance.
Garcia said: “There has been some confusion apparently. I would not mention which partylist because it would be unfair to this parylist congressman. For all I know, that is not true.”
She added that the partylist representative is not a Cebuano. (GPL, RTF)