DESPITE wielding the authority to govern vested on him by the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), acting Toledo City Mayor Antonio Yapha Jr. decries not having the support of the city council and other city hall employees.
“The councilors do not respect me. They still follow him (Toledo City Mayor John Henry Osmeña),” said Yapha in an interview on Monday. Yapha said he also called the department heads to a meeting but no one showed up.
“I’m the acting mayor and yet it seems that they are defying the DILG order,” he said.
Last Thursday, Aug. 30, the DILG served the suspension order issued by the Ombudsman against Osmeña who was found liable for grave abuse of authority over his alleged refusal to release the quarterly real property tax (RPT) shares of Barangay Daanlungsod.
Osmeña already served eight months of the one-year suspension order when the Court of Appeals reversed the Ombudsman’s decision last May.
The anti-graft office, however insisted that he must serve the remaining four months of his suspension.
Osmeña said he will be filing contempt charges against Yapha and DILG-7 officer-in-charge Maria Loisella Lucino.
He said the order suspending him for four more months is invalid because the Court of Appeals has already reversed it.
“There is no valid suspension order,” Osmeña said in a text message.
Yapha also claimed that the suspended mayor was seen in his office on Monday.
Sought for comment, Lucino said she only carried out what their central office told her to do.
“The order for implementation of suspension was from central office and signed by USEC Panadero (Undersecretary Austere Panadero). We just followed the order from Central Office,” she said.
Yapha, for his part, said he assumed as acting mayor simply because the DILG told him so.
“In what way should I be cited in contempt? I’m just following orders from the DILG?” he said.
DILG Provincial Director Jerome Gonzales in an interview, said they recognized Yapha as the present mayor of Toledo City.