ILOILO City – Metro Iloilo Water District (MIWD) is pursuing to its logical conclusion the criminal and administrative charges it filed against Mayor Jose Espinosa III for appointing new directors to the water district Board in June this year even without vacancies.
According to MIWD legal counsel Roy Villa, Espinosa’s following the right process in recently appointing a director to the Board to fill up an impending vacancy won’t have any effect on the charges.
Last week Espinosa appointed to the MIWD Board Felicito Tiu of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry to replace Josephine Abad Caram whose term expires this Dec. 31 as representative of the business sector to the Board.
According to Villa, MIWD may use Espinosa’s recent appointment of Tiu to the Board as evidence to the criminal and administrative charges it filed against the mayor.
“It is an admission on his part, a passive admission, nga ang iya pag-appoint sang June sala,” Villa told Panay News.
In June, Espinosa asserted his authority to appoint a new set of directors that also included Tiu in the MIWD Board. This resulted to him being charged before the Office of the Ombudsman for usurpation of official functions, graft and corrupt, grave abuse of authority, gross negligence, gross misconduct, and acts contrary to law.
In filing the charges, the MIWD management insisted there was no vacancy in the Board yet, Espinosa did not follow the procedure set in making the appointments (select appointees from a list of nominees gathered by the MIWD corporate secretary), and that the appointing authority at that time was the governor of Iloilo province and not the mayor of Iloilo City.
“Padayon gihapon ang kaso,” said Villa.
When Espinosa last week appointed Tiu, the power to appoint already shifted from the provincial governor to the city mayor because, as MIWD itself certified, majority of the water district’s concessionaires were now in Iloilo City and not in Iloilo Province.
Explaining his second appointment of Tiu, Espinosa said, “Kon indi ko mag-appoint, ma-technical, sila (MIWD) ang ma-appoint.”
The mayor was insistent he was the proper appointing authority.
Aside from Tiu, Espinosa’s other appointees to the MIWD Board in June were Rebecca Maravilla (women’s sector), Dr. Ray Celis (civic-oriented service clubs), Antonio Sangrador (sectoral organizations / professional associations), and Ronald Raymund Sebastian (educational institutions).
Last month MIWD corporate secretary Atty. Cyril Regalado submitted to both Iloilo governor Arthur Defensor Sr. and Espinosa a list of nominees to replace Caram.
The nominees included Tiu; Angela Abenir from the association of hotels and restaurants; Francis Chung of the Philippine Retailers Association; and Chelen Regalado from the association of bankers.
MIWD directors each has a term of six years. The current directors are Dr. Teodoro Robles (chairman), Atty. Juanito Acanto, Dr. Jessica Salas, Ramon Cua-Locsin, and Caram.
While Caram’s term would expire by the end of this month, those of Robles and Cua-Locsin would expire in 2020 yet. Those of Acanto and Salas, in 2022.
They were all appointed by Defensor and refused to step down when Espinosa named his own appointees in June./PN
