2 ex-Abra mayors charged with plunder

MANILA, Philippines -  Two former mayors of a municipality in Abra are facing a P133.9-million plunder complaint before the Office of the Ombudsman.

Bernadine Joson, municipal planning and development coordinator and concurrent Sangguniang Bayan secretary also filed graft, technical malversation, forfeiture, and violation of the Government Procurement Reform Act cases against former Lagayan mayors Cecilia Seares Luna and his son Jendricks for allegedly stealing millions from government coffers from 2003 to 2010.

In a 25-page affidavit, Joson accused the former mayors of failing to account government funds for the salary and other benefits of municipal employees, calamity funds and funds intended for development projects among others.

Joson also filed graft charges against incumbent Lagayan Mayor Purificacion Paingan, “for grave misconduct, dereliction of duty and gross negligence” for allowing Jendricks to take over the helm of the municipality and continue his plunder of the town coffers as a barangay captain.

She said Paingan should be held liable for technical malversation for allegedly consenting, through abandonment or negligence to the irregular acts of the former mayor and her son.

 “I also charge Vice Mayor Lara Haya Seares Luna for grave misconduct, dereliction of duty and gross negligence for her chronic absenteeism from her duties as vice mayor and as presiding officer of the Sangguniang Bayan,” she said.

Municipal treasurer Marissa Donato, municipal accountant Meno Dickenson and municipal engineer Osborne Dolaoen were also named respondents in the cases.

In filing the plunder complaint, Joson said she is “exposing a story of how key members of a political family in a small far-flung, underdeveloped town in Abra, over a period of a little more than a decade, in the absence of a viable system of checks and balances, has been raiding and plundering the town’s coffers.”