LOOT
THE Office of the Ombudsman has indicted former Daanbantayan mayor Ma. Luisa Loot and incumbent Councilor Sammy Moralde for malversation of public fund and violation of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act.
Their indictment stemmed from alleged irregular grant of loan to RBA Quail Raisers Association in 2007 to expand its agro-business.
A memorandum of agreement (MOA) granting the association a P500,000 loan was entered into between former mayor Loot and Moralde, being the RBA chairman.
However, the anti-graft office found that Loot and Moralde failed to comply with the conditions in the MOA, including the periodic monitoring and evaluation to ascertain the progress and accomplishment of the projects, proper utilization of the fund and compliance, and monitoring of the quail-raising project to ensure its repayment.
The loan remained unpaid and Moralde claimed that the devastation caused by Typhoon Frank in June 2008 forced the RBA to asked the municipal government to condone the loan.
He further claimed that the RBA documents were destroyed by Super Typhoon Yolanda in November 2013.
Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales rejected their defense and said that both Loot and Moralde “acted with evident bad faith, manifest partiality or gross inexcusable negligence.”
In its investigation, the anti-graft office found that Loot signed the agreement without authority from the Sangguniang Bayan (Council).
“Non-enforcement of RBA’s contractual obligations by Loot is indicative of negligence and/or grant of unwarranted benefit, preference or advantage in favor of respondent Moralde, who, for his part, also failed to comply with the provisions of the MOA,” the Ombudsman’s resolution reads.
The Ombudsman further held that there was nothing in the records that showed the existence of any request for condonation or any action taken by the Sangguniang Bayan on the request.
“Even so, the fact remains that prior and after the typhoon, respondent Loot failed to conduct monitoring and evaluation to ascertain the progress of the project and proper utilization of the funds,” the resolution further read. “No record of any transactions related to the implementation of the project was submitted in evidence.”
When called for comment, Loot said her lawyers are planning to file a motion for reconsideration before the Office of the Ombudsman within five days.
According to Loot, her lawyer told her that the Ombudsman probably overlooked some of the documents they have submitted because everything was well documented, including the Sangguniang Bayan resolution granting her authority to proceed with the loan.
“Mag-file ta karon og motion for reconsideration nga duna pud ta’y mga gi-cite pud didto nga kompleto ta ana before gi-release,” she said.
(I am filing a motion for reconsideration and we will show that we have the complete papers before we released the funds.)
Loot pointed out that some of the documents that they submitted may have been misplaced because even the administrative aspect of the case had already been dismissed.
Loot explained that it was unfortunate that a typhoon struck the quail farm right after the loan was granted, which led to the cooperative’s filing for bankruptcy.
Under the law, malversation is committed by a public official who has custody or control of public funds by reason of the duties of his office and misappropriates, takes, or through abandonment or negligence, permitted another person to take the funds.
On the other hand, Republic Act No. 3019 or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act prohibits public officials from causing any undue injury to any party, including the government, or giving any private party any unwarranted benefits, among others.