REP. Gabriel Luis Quisumbing (Cebu, sixth district) said somebody forged his signature to get his birth certificate.
The Mandaue City mayoralty candidate reported the alleged forgery to the police last Thursday.
He showed reporters yesterday a copy of the allegedly fake authorization letter and a request document bearing what appeared to be erroneous names of the congressman and his parents.
“We’ll take a look at how exactly the breach occurred in the National Statistics Office (NSO),” the congressman said.
Haphazard
The letter, which authorizes Bryan Paragele of Purok Tambis, Barangay Casuntingan, Mandaue City, was dated Dec. 14, 2015. It was signed by Gabriel Luigi Quisumbing. Luigi is the nickname of the congressman.
In the request document, the birth certificate being requested was that of Luis Gabriel Romualdez Quisumbing’s and the name of the parents were Louie Quisumbing and Betsy Romualdez.
Louie and Betsy are nicknames of the congressman’s parents.
“It’s haphazardly done,” Quisumbing said of the authorization letter and the request document.
Asked about whom he suspects as behind it, he said: “I’d rather now draw conclusions.”
He said he may ask the National Bureau of Investigation to investigate who was behind the forgery.
“We hope that the NSO has a CCTV (closed-circuit television) system so that we can trace exactly who, when, where and what was done,” he said.
Quisumbing, who had a blotter of the alleged forgery recorded at the Casuntingan Police Station, said he is alarmed not so much by the possible release of his birth certificate to an unauthorized person, but by what appeared to be a breach of NSO’s confidentiality system.
“The birth certificate is supposed to be a confidential document… In all honesty, I really don’t care very much that my birth certificate was released, it’s fine. But I’m concerned on behalf of private citizens who may face similar circumstances with much more serious repercussions on their part,” he said.
“That’s a highly sensitive document, especially in the case of adopted children. There are many other circumstances in which people may not want that released,” he added.
Trouble
Quisumbing said he understands that being in public service means his records will go under scrutiny, including his birth certificate.
“For the person who requested my birth certificate, he need not have gone to the trouble of forging my signature, he could have simply asked for it if he really wanted it,” he said.
The congressman said he may file a complaint for forgery and impersonation of a public officer, but he will consult first with his party mates.
“We are asking the police to investigate the matter and we will ask the NSO to cooperate fully since this is a matter of their confidentiality system being breached,” he said.