Government retiree: Ombudsman helped resolve loan fiasco

MANILA, Philippines - Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales has been busy fighting graft and corruption in government, but unknown to many, she also helps out ordinary people.   

Zenaida Brioso, a retired Department of Justice employee, can attest to how the former Supreme Court magistrate, through her office’s Public Assistance Bureau (PAB), helped her.

Brioso, 73, said that in May, she wrote letters to different government officials, asking for help with her housing loan payment issues with the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS).

She said she was being asked to pay more for a housing loan that she had already settled in full.

Distressed, she sought the help of the Office of the Ombudsman, Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., GSIS president and general manager Robert Vergara, Senate President Franklin Drilon, the Civil Service Commission, the Commission on Human Rights, and the editors of three newspapers, including The STAR.

Brioso said she even asked for help from Valenzuela City Rep. Sherwin Gatchalian but received no action or response from him.

She said only Morales, Belmonte and Vergara attended to her problem, which was solved after her loan payments were recomputed.

It turned out that the GSIS made an error and now actually owes Brioso a refund amounting to P21,350.66, which will be returned to her on or before Oct. 8.

 “Thank you very much for the kind and swift attention/action,” she told Morales in a letter dated Sept. 8 coursed through PAB acting director Julita Manalac-Calderon.

Brioso said she is very happy with the immediate intervention of the Office of the Ombudsman and Belmonte’s timely follow-up letter, which helped call the attention of Vergara.

With her problems solved, she expressed hope that GSIS personnel “will henceforth work with tender loving care and deep motherly concern to retirees (like me and other GSIS members) who might have no time, stamina and a strong will in asserting their rights which are blatantly violated by the very officials/employees who should protect them in the first place.”

She admonished GSIS personnel to “be kind to retirees (and non-retirees). For soon, in due time, when all of you will reach your golden years like me, you will truly feel how sad and painful it is to be treated shabbily and unjustly.”

Brioso, when asked what she would tell Morales if she could talk to the ombudsman directly, said, “Ma’am, thank you very, very much for giving your precious time to attend to my case.”

She told The STAR that she hopes she would not be the only one in similar circumstances whom Morales would help.