SIQUIJOR Vice Governor Mei Ling Quezon-Brown is facing complaints before the Ombudsman Visayas for grave abuse of authority, serious dishonesty, gross misconduct, gross negligence, and other acts inimical to public interest.
The complaints were filed by San Juan, Siquijor resident Marty Vittorio Saludar against the vice governor for allegedly not allowing anyone to enter the session hall without her permission.
It is stated in the memorandum that the Provincial Board Session and committee hearings should be open to all based on the local government code and their house rules.
The complaint of abuse of power includes threatening a member of the Provincial Board (PB) to be held in contempt during the committee hearing, which is already outside of her concern.
This incident took place on May 30 during the budget hearing where only those invited were allowed to enter the session hall.
The vice governor allegedly ordered PB Member retired Police General Erson Digal to remove lawyer Frank Dinsay from the session hall but he refused.
Because of this, she threatened to cite the retired police official for contempt even though she was not allowed to do so.
Also included in the complaint was Quezon-Brown’s creation of her own committee without the consent of the Provincial Government.
According to the complaint, the PB members opposed the move of the vice governor because it was not mentioned in the basic law, but the latter intervened.
The complainant claimed this is the strategy of the vice governor in order to reopen the budget hearings even though the PB had already done this in the past year.
According to Saludar, Quezon-Brown violated the law during the so-called tug-of-war over whether to approve the 2024 annual budget with a particular adjustment that the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) had approved.
In addition, Quezon-Brown was charged with rearranging the agenda so that she could lead the budget discussion even though the chairs and vice chairs of the committees on finance, appropriations, and ways and means were present.
Additionally, Saludar charged Quezon-Brown with issuing Office Order No. VGO-200-0326, which he claimed went against the Code of Conduct for Public Officials, which stipulates that all public documents ought to be readily available to the public as long as within working hours. (AYB, TPT)