BuCor OIC faces graft raps for not paying NBI contractor

MANILA, Philippines -  An official of the National Bureau of Investigation designated as acting head of the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) was recently charged with graft before the Office of the Ombudsman for not paying at least P14 million the NBI allegedly owed its information technology provider for its biometrics clearance system.

NBI Deputy Director for Comptrollership and BuCor OIC Rafael Marcos Ragos was charged with violating Republic Act 3019 (Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act), RA 6713 (Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards) and Republic Act 9485 (Anti-Red Tape Act) in a complaint filed by Realtime Data Management Services Inc. (RDMSI) last Dec. 13.

RDMSI, through its vice president for external affairs Orlando Dizon, accused Ragos of deliberately withholding payment of at least P14 million for the services rendered by the firm to NBI from July to September this year.

Unjustified refusal

The firm alleged in its 23-page complaint that Ragos refused to process its unpaid billings, causing undue injury to its operations. It cited, for instance, difficulty in purchasing ink cartridges for printers in all its 68 sites nationwide.

“Ragos calculatingly used his office… for his personal interest and to discriminate RDMSI and with utter disregard of the requirement of highest degree of professionalism when he made the unjustified refusal to release the payments of the billings of RDMSI,” it claimed.

Dizon said Justice Secretary Leila de Lima and NBI director Nonnatus Rojas already directed Ragos, whose office is in charge of the bureau’s contracts with private firms, to comply with an earlier demand for payment by RDMSI.

Ragos still failed to deliver and instead questioned the contract forged by RDMSI with the NBI in December last year, Dizon said.

RDMSI forged the contract on Dec. 15, 2011 with the NBI, then under director Magtanggol Gatdula, who was sacked earlier this year over charges of kidnapping and extortion of an undocumented Japanese woman last year.

It was agreed that the NBI will pay the firm “P5 million per month for the entire year of 2012 and that payment of the services should be paid without need of further demand at the end of each month and within 10 days from receipt of billing.”

Aside from liabilities of NBI since July this year, the firm said its services from October to December last year amounting to P17,225,361.90 were also not paid despite due demands.  

He alleged that Ragos sent a memorandum to Rojas “in the guise of raising several issues pertaining to the contract of RDMSI and NBI with the end view of further delaying the payment of billions of RDMSI.”

Preventive suspension

RDMSI also sought the preventive suspension of Ragos to prevent him “from further using his position and powers and prerogatives of his office as an instrument of personal vendetta and to influence potential witnesses of tampoering with records which may be vital in the prosecution of this case.”

Dizon said Ragos committed grave misconduct, “which makes his acts in question also punishable by dismissal from service.”

Ragos was tapped by De Lima last month to temporarily head BuCor in place of Parole and Probation Administrator Manuel Co following a grenade explosion that rocked the maximum security compound of New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa City.

In appointing Ragos as officer-in-charge of BuCor, De Lima said he has “the fire, toughness and single-mindedness of character to immediately install drastic buy effective changes to address the major problems in the BuCor, such as smuggling and trade in illegal drugs and other contraband.”