Cebu governor won’t apologize to Ombudsman
CEBU CITY – “Noted. Salamat po (Thank you).”
This was the reaction of Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia to the latest press statement of Ombudsman Samuel Martires who criticized the governor for not stepping down despite a six-month preventive suspension order against her.
The governor deemed it confusing that Martires released more statements after his initial announcement where he likened the quarry operations at Cebu’s Mananga River to be worse than the environmental violations involving the Chocolate Hills of Bohol.
“I did find it remarkable that Ombudsman Samuel Martires had two other full press statements aside from the first one… And then there was another lengthy statement where the Ombudsman was demanding an apology from me,” she said in a press conference on Saturday.
Garcia said she does not owe anyone an apology.
“Who owes who an apology? Who indeed owes who an apology? That’s a question,” she said.
The anti-graft body on April 29 said the preventive suspension order against Garcia was meant to pave the way for an investigation into the permit the governor granted to a construction firm that had no environment clearance for desilting works on the Mananga River during the prolonged El Niño phenomenon in 2024.
Staying put
But instead of following the anti-graft office’s order, Garcia announced on April 30 that she is staying put in office while she seeks clarification from Interior Secretary Juanito Victor Remulla on the matter.
According to Garcia and her lawyers, section 62 (c) of the Local Government Code provides that no preventive suspension order shall be imposed within 90 days before the election, and that any suspension of a local elective official without prior approval of the Commission on Elections shall constitute an election offense under the Omnibus Election Code.
Garcia’s camp believed politics had something to do with the issuance of the preventive suspension order.
In a recent statement, Martires said Garcia owed the Office of the Ombudsman an apology for her “unfounded accusation and malicious insinuation that politics is involved in the issuance of the preventive suspension order.”
Garcia expressed doubts about the process behind her preventive suspension, pointing out that the order only bore the signature of Martires and showed no indication of involvement from any other official in the Office of the Ombudsman.
“There was never anyone else involved in investigating the administrative complaint. The order only has one signature,” the governor said.
Unusual speed
Lawyer Rory Jon Sepulveda, Garcia’s legal counsel, questioned the timeline and procedures surrounding the issuance of the suspension.
He said the governor’s camp only obtained a full copy of the complaint on May 2, leaving them in the dark about the details of the allegations for several days.
Sepulveda said the preventive suspension order they received on April 28 made no mention of an investigative panel.
It was only on April 30, he said, that a special panel was officially created as shown in the order they received on May 2.
According to Sepulveda, this confirmed that the special investigative panel was only formed after the suspension order had already been signed.
The lawyer further pointed out the unusual speed with which the Office of the Ombudsman acted on the case, saying the suspension order for the administrative complaint was signed just three days after its filing.
“As (the governor) had noted, we have noticed the inordinate interest of the person or official of the Ombudsman of this case three days after the filing without any intervention and he already signed the suspension order for the administrative case,” Sepulveda said.
The issue stemmed from a complaint filed by Moises Garcia Deiparine over the special permit the governor issued to Shalom Construction Inc. in May 2024 without the mandatory clearances from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) such as the environmental compliance certificate.
Garcia stressed that the issuance of the special permit in question was driven solely by the urgent need to address the critical water shortage that had severely affected the entire franchise area of the Metropolitan Cebu Water District, which includes Cebu City and seven other local governments.
She said all decisions were undertaken in close collaboration with the affected local governments as well as with the government agencies tasked to regulate environmental matters namely the DENR, the Environmental Management Bureau, and the Mines and Geosciences Bureau.
Her course of action was also carried out with the approval of the provincial board, which had earlier declared the entire province of Cebu under a state of calamity due to a water shortage.
