Noy names new overall deputy ombudsman

MANILA, Philippines - President Aquino appointed a lawyer who reportedly helped craft the plunder case against detained former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo as the new overall deputy ombudsman.

In a news briefing yesterday, Secretary Herminio Coloma of the Presidential Communications Operations Office officially announced the designation of Melchor Carandang as the new overall deputy ombudsman. He will serve until 2020.

Carandang served as assistant ombudsman prior to his appointment.

He will be replacing Orlando Casimiro, who retired from government service last Aug. 23. 

Carandang was a protegé of former ombudsman Simeon Marcelo, a former law partner of senior Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio, the cousin of Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales who reportedly handpicked Carandang as the ombudsman’s second highest official.

Lawyers said Morales made known her preference for Carandang at the level of the Judicial and Bar Council, the constitutional body that screens applicants to the judiciary and the Office of Ombudsman and submits a shortlist of nominees to the President.  

Highly reliable sources also said that Carandang helped craft the plunder case against Arroyo, now a congresswoman of Pampanga province, despite recommendations by a panel of ombudsman prosecutors that she be charged with technical malversation, which is a lesser and bailable offense.