Ombudsman urged to speed up ruling on plunder raps vs Fuentebella

MANILA, Philippines - Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales is being  asked to speed up the resolution of an almost three-year-old plunder case against former speaker Arnulfo Fuentebella.

In a supplemental complaint, former Camarines Sur governor Luis Raymund Villafuerte said a  special audit report of the Commission on Audit (COA) from 2007 to 2009 had bolstered evidence of Fuentebella’s guilt and that of three members of his immediate family holding elective posts.

“Recently, I discovered further similar and related unlawful acts of Arnulfo which, supported by evidence gathered by no less than the COA, bolster all the more his guilt for plunder,” he said.

Villafuerte said any delay and inaction in the disposition of the cases can easily cause great injustice.

It is damaging and prejudicial to the complainant, considering that the plunder charge was filed way back in September 2011, he added.

Quoting the audit report, Villafuerte said the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) released for the years 2007 to 2009 P197.8 million in Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) to Fuentebella in his capacity as representative of the 3rd district of Camarines Sur.

“Arnulfo caused the award of multi-million worth of contracts to suppliers identified by himself but whose legal and physical existence are questionable,” read the supplemental complaint.

“This COA special audit report, which touched off last year’s discovery of the P10-billion pork scam in Congress and subsequent imprisonment of its suspected mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles, had uncovered irregularities in the release of at least P40.27 million of the almost P200 million worth of PDAF and Various Infrastructures including Local Projects (VILP) funds that were coursed through Fuentebella during that audited three-year period.” 

Villafuerte had filed plunder and graft charges against Fuentebella, Sagnay town Mayor Evelyn Fuentebella, Tigaon town Mayor Arnulf Bryan Fuentebella, and former lawmaker and Housing and Land Use Regulatory Board (HLURB) commissioner Felix William Fuentebella before the Office of the Ombudsman on Sept. 15, 2011.

His complaint accused Fuentebella and his family of stealing over P80 million in public funds through questionable government-funded projects like the construction of a P15-million road, a multi-purpose building, a lighthouse, a seawall, and a sports complex among others in properties owned by them or in areas that will not benefit the public.

Fuentebella denied the allegations.