Dismissed Lanao Sur mayor flees amid threats

CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY, Philippines – A dismissed mayor of Lanao del Sur has fled his hometown, citing threats to his life from his rivals.

The Office of the Ombudsman dismissed Ditsa-an Ramain town Mayor Ali Untao Adiong, a member of the Liberal Party, for grave abuse of authority, grave misconduct and oppression for ordering the burning of a truck hired by the Lanao del Sur Electric Cooperative Inc. to install concrete electric posts and distribution lines in the municipality.

Adiong, through his lawyer, Aimee Neri Torre-Franca, has filed a motion for reconsideration and petitioned the Court of Appeals for the issuance of a temporary restraining order. Both are still pending resolution.

Torre-Franca said they have secured Adiong somewhere in northern Mindanao.

“We don’t want him to go home unless peace and order is restored there. If his foes see him there, there could be conflict,” Torre-Franca said during a press conference on Wednesday.

She said Vice Mayor Anna Mahlyne Abedin-Macarampat of the Nationalist People’s Coalition, took her oath as mayor on Nov. 10 even before the Department of the Interior and Local Government in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao received a copy of the ombudsman ruling.