Graft charges have been filed before the Sandiganbayan against a former Iloilo town mayor and a municipal engineer from Sultan Kudarat, the Office of the Ombudsman announced.
The Ombudsman filed on Thursday before the Sandiganbayan two graft charges against former Dingle town mayor Rufino Palabrica III, who issued a business permit and a lease contract in favor of his own drug store and medical clinic in 2013.
In a seven-page resolution, Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales indicted Palabrica, now a municipal councilor, for conflict of interest between his official duties and his business interests.
Palabrica signed the lease contract both as lessor and lessee in January 2013.
Morales invoked Section 3(h) of Republic Act 3019 that prohibits a public officer from having a direct or indirect financial or pecuniary interest in any business, contract or transaction within which he intervenes or takes part in his official capacity in connection with such interest.
Meanwhile, the Ombudsman also found probable cause to charge Arlene Olivar, municipal engineer of Kalamansig, Sultan Kudarat, with graft.
The case arose from Olivar’s failure to disclose that her mother owned the store from which the municipality bought an IXUS Digital Camera worth P16,000 in March 2011.
The camera was bought to document the progress of the Mindanao Rural Development Program.
In an eight-page resolution, the Ombudsman said Olivar had a direct or indirect financial or pecuniary interest in the transaction.
“She displayed manifest partiality in favor of Olivar Store when she did not divulge to her co-respondents that Olivar Store is owned by her mother,” the charge sheet read.