5 vie for deputy ombudsman for Mindanao

MANILA, Philippines - The Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) has short-listed five final nominees for the position of deputy ombudsman for Mindanao vacated by the retirement of Humphrey Monteroso last month.

Assistant Ombudsman Rodolfo Elman and lawyer Rowena Apao-Adlawan topped the list after garnering five of seven votes from JBC members during deliberations last Monday.

The three others in the list are Ombudsman director Maria Iluminada Lapid-Viva and lawyers Romeo Alcantara and Melinda Alconcel-Dayanghirang, who each got four votes.

Republic Act 6700 (the law creating the Office of the Ombudsman) requires a deputy ombudsman to “be natural-born citizens of the Philippines, at least forty (40) years old, of recognized probity and independence, members of the Philippine Bar, and must not have been candidates for any elective national or local office in the immediately preceding election whether regular or special.”

The JBC also recently started the selection process for the position of deputy ombudsman for the military and other law enforcement offices to be vacated next month by the retirement of Emilio Gonzales III, the controversial official who was earlier dismissed from the service by Malacañang over the bloody hostage-taking incident in Rizal Park on Aug. 23, 2010.

Last Tuesday, the Supreme Court (SC) affirmed its earlier ruling voiding the Malacañang order in March 2011 for the dismissal from the service of Gonzales for allegedly mishandling the case of dismissed policeman Senior Inspector Rolando Mendoza, who held hostage a busload of Chinese tourists from Hong Kong in the incident where eight Hong Kong nationals were killed.

The SC denied the motion of the solicitor general and stood firm on its September 2012 ruling that Malacañang “(fell) short of the constitutional standard of betrayal of public trust,” which should be the ground for dismissal of the official holding such a post.

In the same ruling, the SC took away the disciplinary power of the President over deputies of the ombudsman.

It ruled that the administrative authority being imposed by the Office of the President on the position of deputy ombudsman is unconstitutional.