LTO chief Torres back to work this month

MANILA, Philippines -  President Aquino said yesterday Land Transportation Office (LTO) chief Virginia Torres will report back to work after he asked her to take a 60-day leave and pave the way for an investigation into the allegations against her.

“I think the penalty that was prescribed has already been meted out. And she will resume her duties by Saturday, the third of this month,” Aquino told reporters in a press briefing as he announced the appointment of former senator Manuel Roxas II as the new secretary of the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC).

Torres will be under Roxas, who declined to comment on Torres’ case, saying he has yet to study the allegations against her.

Stradcom Corp., which provides information technology services and maintains the LTO’s database for motor vehicle registration and drivers’ license holders, filed a case against Torres for non-payment of its services.

The President said a report that reached his office contained questions on whether Torres favored either of the contending parties in Stradcom.

On Dec. 9, 2010, around 40 armed men took over Stradcom’s main headquarters in Quezon City upon orders from businessmen Bonifacio Sumbilla and Aderito Yujuico.

The Department of Justice (DOJ), on March 4, recommended Torres’ dismissal from service for her alleged complicity in the takeover, which led to an almost six-hour disruption of LTO operations.

A DOJ fact-finding committee also recommended to the DOTC the filing of gross negligence or gross incompetence charges against Torres for having “favored” Sumbilla and Yujuico’s group because she did not prevent the takeover even when she had prior knowledge of it.

The LTO chief and her aide Menelia Mortel were caught by a closed-circuit television camera entering the Stradcom building with Sumbilla and Yujuico.

Apart from the takeover, Torres had allegedly been withholding six months’ worth of payment to Stradcom amounting to P1 billion.

The President said he had asked Torres and others at the LTO about the benefits the government was getting from Stradcom.

“And the people representing LTO could not really give me a definitive answer as to what benefits the people accrue from the Stradcom deal. If at all, the main claim is that we have computerized the records as opposed to inputting it manually? It is a P1.3-billion contract, I understand, yearly,” Aquino said.

“Now her position that she stated was to come up with terms of reference in the subsequent ending of the contract of Stradcom,” the President said.

Aquino said he wants a system that would be able to stop the modus operandi of carjackers in using registered license plates of wrecked vehicles for their stolen cars.

“That cannot be done by computers alone…Stradcom does not have that capability. So that is what we’re running after, whatever is more beneficial to the people,” Aquino said.