Mayor, vice guv, 11 other Guimaras officials charged before Ombudsman
Iloilo -- There is trouble, major trouble, in the confines of Guimaras governance as one town mayor, the island's vice governor and eleven other top provincial government officials were hurled before the Office of the Ombudsman in the Visayas for a criminal complaint.
Received by the Anti-Graft body Friday, lawyer Cornelio Panes filed usurpation charges for and in behalf of his client, Buenavista Sanggunian Bayan member Jonayreh Gaitano. Recipients of their complaint - Buenavista Mayor Samuel Gumarin, Guimaras Vice Governor Aurelio Tionada and members of the Guimaras Provincial Board, Vicente De Asis, David Gano, Rolando Gadnanan, Hernane Galanza, Allan Chavez, Josefina dela Cruz, Edgardo Diaz, Avelino Gonzaga, April Rose Gange, Salvador Talaman and Carmelina Fernandez.
The complaint stemmed from the order of the Vice Governor and the concurrence of the Guimaras SP to hear the administrative case filed by Mayor Gumarin against his Vice Mayor.
Yet as Councilor Gaitano argued, the said officials "knowingly and consciously used" a provision of the law "to shield their criminal act of usurping the exclusive official function and jurisdiction of the Sanggunian Bayan of Buenavista, Guimaras."
"It is clear from the aforementioned acts of Mayor Gumarin and the members of the SP-Guimaras that they conspired and confederated with one another in USURPING the exclusive authority and official function of the Sangguniang Bayan over administrative cases of such nature which powers and functions were vested by law only on the Sanggunian concerned," excerpts of the four-page Affidavit stated while adding that the move was also meant to persecute the Vice Mayor and politically harass him.