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By Alberto Vicente

THE 2016 local election promises to be intense, heated and tough.

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Social media was abuzz with the order of Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales to dismiss Cagayan de Oro Mayor Oscar S. Moreno and two other Mindanao mayors.

A friend sent me a private message on Facebook to ask what was happening. I didn’t get it and so I answered, “It’s all fine.” Then I realized something significant must have happened. Then a Youtube post on Mayor Moreno’s statement to the Ombudsman’s order began circulating on the Internet, along with online breaking news on the matter.

I had to Google in order to educate myself on what case had done the mayor and city treasurer in. I realized that the case was filed in March this year by a distraught former barangay chairman. And lo and behold, after eight months, the swashbuckling lady Ombudsman had the heads of the mayor and city treasurer Glenn Banez rolling.

I will leave the merits of the case to the lawyers. But the speed with which this case has been resolved, to the merriment of Moreno’s blood-thirsty political rivals and public who have gone frustrated by corruption in government, is something worth pondering upon.

I have no doubt Mayor Moreno can survive this based on merits, and come out strong in the May 16 polls.

I also have “grudging respect” for Dongkoy Emano for surviving the ruling of the Commission on Elections to unseat him as governor of Misamis Oriental in 1997 because former governor Ruth Guingona was cheated in 1995 elections. How was he able to stay a lot of cases filed against him? Hopefully though, he will finally face the music in the recent criminal indictment for oppressing a city hall employee, Leonor Esparcia, and pay up along with his minions in the P31-million Scantel funds as ordered by the Commission on Audit.

I know of a case filed before the Ombudsman against Emano and other City Hall officials years back for alleged over pricing of medicine and equipment in the City Hall-owned JR Borja Hospital. To date none has been heard of that case. Why? The public deserves to know since it is also a case of public interest.

A blog written by lawyer Manuel Ravanera on Dec. 23, 2007 mentioned these:

“So many anomalous transactions were entered into by the hospital prejudicing the coffers of the city. All these transactions, however, are shown in the vouchers appended in the Affidavit-Complaints. Payments were made through the approving officers of the City Hall namely: City Administrator Criscelda Joson, City Treasurer Lino Daral, City Accountant Wilma Rugay, City Auditor Olivia Flores and the highest approving officer then, City Mayor Vicente Y. Emano.” (You can read the whole article at http://ningravs.blogspot.com/2007/12/wasted-gift-or-emaciation-of-hospital.html?m=1)

For this, there is reason to take into consideration what can be heard from the grapevine about the existence of some wily operators, who may engage in pushing and pulling papers in the courts and in the Ombudsman. I can understand why one of City Hall’s lawyers asked aloud: Was the Counter-Affidavit (of Mayor Moreno) removed from the record of the case?

Now on the filer, a former barangay chairman and business fixer, with alleged links to illegal gambling and mining. In his own admission before the 2013 elections, he participated in the alleged bribery or bribery attempt on officials identified with the Emano administration. I will hold my judgment on Guialani but any Tom, Dick and Harry in Taglimao, Carmen and elsewhere knows he is not an epitome of good manners and right conduct.

Pressures to silence, bullying on social media and other squid tactics on political advocates are now employed. I think that at the end of the day, these people will just be exposing their true character as champions of a defunct, elitist and malevolent political ideology that had left the city in decrepit condition for more than 15 years. That these people are just patrons of a political ideology that just promotes transactional governance for the benefit of City Hall rent-seekers. —Alberto Vicente, Cagayan de Oro

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