7 NFA personnel relieved for rice re-bagging scam

CEBU, Philippines- Seven personnel of the National Food Authority-Region 6 were booted from their post after a July 31 raid at a warehouse in Leganes, Iloilo where thousands of sacks of NFA rice were found being re-packed as commercial rice.

Hedy Jardeleza, NFA acting assistant regional director, said four of the ousted men were from NFA-Iloilo province while the three are from Capiz province.

Jardeleza did not name the personnel but those relieved were provincial managers of NFA Iloilo and Capiz, two investigators and two grains operations supervisor or warehouse managers in the two provinces.

The relief, Jardeleza clarified, was a matter of protocol. “We want to avoid any whitewash. It’s for them not to influence the ongoing investigation,” she added.

A team from the NFA main office will arrive to augment the conduct of the investigation. In the interim, the relieved personnel will be detailed at the NFA-6 regional office.

Last week, Secretary Francis Pangilinan, presidential assistant for food security and agricultural modernization, vowed that he will left no stones unturned on the alleged illegal distribution of government rice.

Pangilinan earlier declared that NFA managers will be made to explain why the government rice stocks ended in a private warehouse in Leganes town of Iloilo.

Pangilinan was in Iloilo after members of the National Bureau of Investigation–Region 6 raided the warehouse of Rescha Marketing, owned by Dennis Devicente, where a total of 1,047 sacks of “repacked” rice from the NFA were seized.

According to the NBI-6 operatives, they got a lead to raid Devicente’s warehouse after they saw three small trucks coming out of the NFA warehouse in Jaro district of Iloilo City around 4:30 p.m. of July 30.

An NBI-6 agent said they immediately conducted the raid several hours following such discovery. It was then found out that a big truck also delivered sacks of NFA rice to Devicente’s warehouse, coming from an NFA warehouse at Barangay Laua-an in Roxas City of Capiz.