CITING a report of the Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability of the House of Representatives, the Office of the Ombudsman ordered the preventive suspension of incumbent Nueva Ecija Gov. Aurelio Umali who is facing administrative charges triggered by the issuance of allege illegal quarry permits in the province.
“This office finds sufficient grounds to preventively suspend Governor Aurelio M. Umali considering that there is a strong evidence showing his guilt; as the charges against him involves gross misconduct and gross neglect in the performance of duty which may warrant his removal from the service,” said the anti-graft body in a recently-released three-page resolution.
Umali, together with his wife, former Gov. Czarina Umali, and Natural Resources Officer Wilfredo M. Pangilinan are facing administrative complaints for grave misconduct, gross neglect of duty and conduct prejudicial to the best interest of the service under the 2017 Rules on Administrative Cases in the Civil Service.
Complainant Roberto M. Duldulao accused the three officials of conspiring in issuing a total 205 quarry permits for extraction of sand and gravel to “unqualified permittees” who failed to submit mandatory Environmental Compliance Certificate issued by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.
Instead of requiring the submission of ECC’s, which is provided by Republic Act 7942 or the Philippine Mining Act and Presidential Decree 1586 or the Environmental Impact Statement System Act, spouses Umali merely required quarry applicants to secure Local Environment Clearance Certificates in lieu of ECCs.
Ombudsman investigators cited Committee Report No. 967 of the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability which pointed out that accepting LECC’s, instead of ECC’s, “is a clear circumvention of the law.”
“On the other hand, PENRO Wilfredo M. Pangilinan conspired with and joined spouses Umali in the commission of the unlawful act by his continued observance and issuance of recommendation for the approval of quarry permits with the use only of the LECC,” the Ombudsman order stated.
Anti-graft probers also found the two incumbent and former provincial officials of being “remiss” in their duty to remit to local government units hosting the quarry operations the excise taxes the province collected from the quarry permit holders.
“Further, after the Provincial Government of Nueva Ecija collected taxes on the extracted sand and gravel, the shares of said taxes of the LGUs concerned were not released,” noted the Ombudsman.
The Ombudsman stressed that the incumbent governor’s suspension is necessary to preserve documents and evidence in its investigation of the cases and “in order to avoid his commission of further malfeasance and/or misfeasance in office.”
The incumbent governor is on his second term as governor of Nueva Ecija. He was elected in 2019, replacing his wife, Czarina, who served a single term as governor starting 2016.
