Sandigan convicts ex-Abra mayor

The Sandiganbayan has sentenced a former Abra mayor to 10 years in jail after he was found guilty of delaying the retirement benefits of a municipal official who had since died due to an illness.

In a 27-page decision promulgated last Jan. 23, the anti-graft court’s first division convicted Casimiro Gayyed, former mayor of Luba, Abra, in connection with the graft complaint filed against him in 1997 by Celedonio Valera, who had retired as municipal planning and development coordinator three years earlier.

The anti-graft court also ordered Gayyed to indemnify Valera’s heirs with P122,895 and pay a decade’s worth of interests on his delayed retirement benefits.

The Sandiganbayan directed the Luba municipal government to release to Valera’s family the remaining balance of his gratuity and terminal leave pay amounting to P122,895.

"For a retiree like Valera, there is no injury more undue than for one to die without enjoying the full rewards of one’s long service to the government because of unreasonable refusal to pay them by the person duly bound to cause payment thereof," it said.

Court records showed that Valera retired in 1994 due to a condition called cervical cord compression which left most of his body paralyzed.

His widow testified that Valera’s condition could have been corrected through surgery if only her husband’s benefits totaling P310,000 were promptly released.

Because of the delay in the release of his benefits, Valera filed a complaint against Gayyed with the Office of the Ombudsman in 1998. As a result, the Luba municipal government released P187,105 of the total amount.

However, Valera’s condition had deteriorated by then and he was already bedridden.

In his defense, Gayyed claimed that there was no malice in the delayed release of Valera’s retirement benefits, saying that the municipal government simply had no money for the purpose.

This, however, was debunked by prosecutors who presented to the court the annual budgets of Luba for 1995 and 1996, which showed that appropriations were made for Valera’s benefits under the item "personal services." It was not explained though where the allocations went to.

"As the prosecution has fully shown, accused’s refusal to pay Valera was done in evident bad faith. It was a refusal completely bereft of rhyme or reason despite knowledge that Valera was in desperate need of money and thus partook of the nature of fraud," the Sandiganbayan said.