Davide defends 2 towns facing DILG charges

CEBU, Philippines — Cebu Governor Hilario Davide III came to the defense of two town mayors who are facing administrative charges for “failing”  to create an Anti-Drug Abuse Council (ADAC).

The Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) on Wednesday filed admin charges before the Office of the Ombudsman against 51 mayors, including three chief executives from Cebu, over their “unorganized” and “low functioning” ADACs.

They are San Fernando Mayor Lakambini Reluya, San Francisco Mayor Aly Arquillano, and Toledo City Mayor John Henry "Sonny Osmeña.

The officials reportedly violated Republic Act 9165 or the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act.

The governor said he was surprised with the charges because San Fernando and San Francisco towns have complied with the requirements set by Cebu Provincial Anti-Drug Abuse Office (CPADAO).

He said the towns have set substantial amount to fund their respective local drug programs and have organized their ADACs.

He said San Francisco is even categorized as a drug-cleared town.

He said it is unfair for these local government units to be involved in a legal case when in fact they are doing their responsibilities, particularly in facilitating and organizing anti-drug programs and other initiatives.

With this, Davide is asking the DILG head office to re-check its assessment if indeed these two towns have failed and violated RA 9165.

“Dili unta angay maapil sila,” he said.

Davide said only Toledo City has not adopted the CPADAO-facilitated drug program dubbed “Sugbo Kontra Droga (SUKOD).”

In a statement, CPADAO said the DILG complaint was based on the result of the first-ever DILG ADAC performance audit conducted last year.

The audit showed that San Francisco and Toledo City were noncompliant, while San Fernando was categorized as “low functionality” for only scoring 32 points.

But CPADAO’s assessment was different.

The provincial government, through CPADAO, initiated in 2016, before the inception of the DILG audit, the SUKOD program, which has its own systematic ADAC monitoring and performance management system.

The SUKOD evaluation program sets performance indicators to measure the functionality of the ADACs and effectiveness of the implementation of mandated anti-drug programs.

“The SUKOD Evaluation result shows that, for the audit year 2017 (basis of DILG audit), only the City of Toledo is non-compliant whereas the municipalities of San Fernando and San Francisco have organized and functional ADACs,” CPADAO said in a statement.

DILG-Cebu Provincial Director Jerome Gonzales explained that the discrepancies of the audit results between SUKOD and DILG were partly due to the difference in the evaluation process, as well as the time constraints in the submission of documents by the Local Government Operations Officers to the DILG provincial office.

One of the grounds of the DILG for filing a case was that these mayors either fail to allocate budget for anti-drug abuse programs or fail to implement community-based rehabilitation program.

CPADAO emphasized that the provincial government pushed for a resolution in 2015 requiring the mayors to strictly include anti-drug programs in their annual budget.

In fact, the office said the municipalities of San Fernando and San Francisco and Toledo City have complied with the directive allocating budget for their anti-drug abuse programs from 2016 to present.

Moreover, both San Fernando and San Francisco towns have implemented the Community-Based Rehabilitation Program (CBRP) with enrollees and completers from 2017 to present.

The provincial government, through CPADAO and DILG-Cebu, plans in the next audit period to coordinate closely with the Local Government Operations Officers and the ADAC focal persons in all cities and municipalities in Cebu to harmonize efforts in keeping ADACs’ organized and functional.

In a separate statement, lawyer Inocencio dela Cerna also defended Osmeña, saying that DILG should have been more circumspect in its action and should have verified the report first.

As early as 2016, he said, Osmeña already created and convened the CADAC and this could be proven by records of the office.

“Toledo City CADAC was functioning at its inception.  Due to the mayor's suspension, however, Vice Mayor Yapha took over and headed the CADAC and he may have neglected to perform his duty as acting mayor and head of CADAC,” he said.

“When Mayor Sonny was reinstated in the late 2018, Toledo City CADAC of which he headed again was fully functioning and had regular meetings up to the present,” he added. — KBQ (FREEMAN)