Late DFA consul wanted to work overtime

Now here’s a real ghost employee.

A security guard at the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) claimed yesterday the ghost of an employee who died with three colleagues in a highway accident last weekend wanted to work overtime, or at least have one more chance to log in, hours after she was killed.

The security guard, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Foreign Service Officer 1 Marivic Gaverza asked him to open their office on the 14th floor at 10:30 p.m. Saturday.

Unaware of the misfortune that befell Gaverza, he looked for the key only to find her gone when he returned.

Consul Gaverza, who was special assistant to Undersecretary for International Economic Relations Rosario Manalo, died with three other DFA employees and their driver when the van they were riding collided with a bus in Isabela province Saturday morning.

Another DFA employee requesting anonymity said Gaverza had sent a cellfone text message to a friend Saturday afternoon which read: "Ang lamig naman dito, para akong Tarsan na hubad. (It’s so cold in here. I am like a naked Tarzan)."

It turned out that Gaverza’s cellular phone was not working and that she left it with her husband that day, so she could not have possibly used it.

Manalo described Gaverza as a "lady in a hurry" as she wanted to finish her tasks immediately. But Manalo said it did not mean she was inefficient since she could do her job right and fast.

If assigned abroad, Gaverza would have served as consul and first secretary.

On the other hand, lawyer and FSO3 Caren Cañon, who served as special assistant to Undersecretary for Administration Franklin Ebdalin, had given a premonition of her death, according to another unnamed DFA employee.

The anonymous employee said that during a meeting of the DFA Multipurpose Cooperative Inc. just days before the accident, the one checking the members’ attendance could not see Cañon anymore in her seat, but just an aura.

Ebdalin paid tribute to her by saying the department lost in her an officer that was full of promise, young and brilliant as she was.

Her boss further said that he never saw her brooding, and would be smiling all the time despite the workload she had.

"She was very jolly. She would greet everyone with a smile. Too bad she is gone too: only 28 and a law graduate from the University of the Philippines," Ebdalin said.

Gaverza and Cañon were two of the five people who were killed in the accident, which took place while they were on official business. The two other fatalities were part of the DFA staff and the fifth was the driver of the van.

The DFA group completed a mission in Baguio City that Saturday and were on their way to their office in Tuguegarao City when their vehicle burst a tire and veered to the opposite lane, smashing into the Manila-bound passenger bus in Isabela.

Foreign Secretary Domingo Siazon Jr. said it was unfortunate to lose four members of the small DFA family.