People’s initiative proponent Garcia charged with plunder, graft

Bataan Gov. Enrique Garcia Jr., the main proponent of a new people’s initiative to amend the Constitution, was charged yesterday with plunder and graft and corruption before the Office of the Ombudsman based on allegations that he closed down a paper plant in the province and sold its machinery and equipment worth P200 million in 2003.

In filing the complaint, former workers Josechito Gonzaga, Ruel Magsino and Alfredo Santos of Sunrise Paper Products Inc. said Garcia violated Republic Act 7080 (Plunder Law) and Republic Act 3019 (the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act) when he sold the machinery without the consent of the displaced workers.

The Bataan Regional Trial Court discovered that the equipment were sold although the plant’s former owners were not able to pay the agreed P50 million, read the complaint.

The former workers said Garcia entered into an “illegal agreement” with the paper plant’s former owners to take out the machinery for P50 million without regard to the court’s order to secure the equipment to protect their rights and those of the creditors.

“It was clear from the decision of the court that the agreement was done (in) bad faith, (with) criminal intent, gross negligence and utter disregard to the orders of the court and the Court of Appeals,” read the complaint.

On the other hand, Garcia said that the removal of the equipment was done with the approval of the Commission on Audit (COA), which a COA director denied before a court in Bataan.

In 2003, Garcia closed down the paper plant in Barangay Dona in Orani, Bataan after its owners failed to pay about P2.5 million in back taxes.

When the paper plant closed down, the workers were not given their separation pay and benefits.

They filed a case against the corporation before the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC), which ordered the company to pay the workers P4.8 million.

Some 36 complainants initially filed the case and were followed by 18 others.

However, the owners refused to pay the workers on grounds that the Bataan provincial government was the new owner of the plant.

Other respondents in the case are lawyer Aurelio Angeles Jr., provincial legal officer; Rodolfo de Mesa, former provincial administrator; Emerlinda Talento, OIC-provincial treasurer; Benjamin Alonzo, former vice governor and presiding officer of Sangguniang Panlalawigan; Sangguniang Panlalawigan members Rodolfo SD. Izon, Manuel Beltran, Edward Roman, Edgardo Calimbas, Orlando Miranda, and Eduard Florendo; former Sangguniang Panlalawigan members Rodolfo Salandanan, Dante Manalaysay, and Fernando Austria; Police Chief Superintendent Ismael Rafanan, former Philippine National Police Region 3 director (Camp Olivas, Pampanga); former Orani, Bataan police chief P/Supt. Asterio Cumigad; Evelyn Miranda, president of Sunrise Paper Products Industries Inc.; retired colonel Fernando Vinculado, Jose Carandang, barangay chairman of Malaya, Mariveles, Bataan, and Eduardo Garcia.