Charges readied vs 27 officials in PDMB scam

Twenty-seven officials of the Public Estates Authority and the Commission on Audit as well as a private contractor were recommended charged with graft by the Office of the Ombudsman yesterday for allegedly conspiring to overprice the President Diosdado Macapagal Boulevard by P532 million.

In a 60-page resolution, Ombudsman Simeon Marcelo said that although the acts of the officials seemed to be independent of each other, they "were in fact connected" in granting unwarranted benefits to the project’s contractor, JD Legaspi.

"They all tend toward the accomplishment of the same felonious object to give Legaspi unwarranted benefit," read a portion of the resolution, which also approved the filing of graft charges before the Sandiganbayan today. The plunder suit, however, was junked due to "insufficiency of evidence."

Ombudsman probers said undue preference and advantage was given to JD Legaspi as the six-kilometer stretch was found to have been "overpriced by 250 percent" while the bridge constructed was also "overpriced by 67 percent."

Marcelo said that as a result, the deal "caused undue injury to the government as their acts resulted in the overpricing of the PDMB project."

The government, he added, "suffered undue injury, at the very least, in the amount of P532.9 million."

Among those recommended charged were Frisco San Juan, Carlos Doble, Carmelita de Leon Chan, Daniel Dayan, Salvador Malbarosa, Leo Padilla, Elpidio Damaso, Ernest Villareal, Benjamin Cariño, Joemari Gerochi, Angelito Villanueva, Martin Samaniego, Rodolfo Tuazon, Ernesto Enriquez, Jaime Milan, Manuel Berina, Bernardo Viray, Theron Victor Lacson, Raphael Pocholo Zorilla, Cristina Amposta-Mortel, Manuel dela Paz, Arturo Layug, Benilda Mendoza, Epifanio Pureza, Jose Capistrano, Ma. Cecilia dela Rama and Jesuito Legaspi.