Cagayan de Oro City Mayor Jaraula facing legal charges for suspending Maandig

September 5, 2008

By Lizanilla J. Amarga

Cagayan de Oro City Mayor Constantino Jaraula is now facing legal charges at a local court for suspending Assistant City Legal Officer Atty. Mart Maandig.

A complaint for suspending a Civil Service officer without procedural due process in violation of Civil Service Resolution No. 991936 and Administrative Code of 1987 is now lodged against the city mayor at the Regional Trial Court Branch 41.

Maandig said he filed the charges, which he filed against the city mayor last Wednesday (Sept. 3, 2008), is aimed to nullify Memorandum No. 302 dated July 9, 2008 that placed him under a 25-day work-without-pay suspension.

He said the nullification is to clear his name and government service record from any taint brought by Jaraula’s suspension order.

“Klarohon ko lang walay labot ang politika niini (I just want to make it clear that politics have nothing to do with my filing of the charges),” he told Gold Star Daily.

He nevertheless admitted that he informed former city mayor now vice-mayor Vicente Emano of his move to slap their PaDayon Pilipino top-ranking official Jaraula with legal charges.

Jaraula suspended Maandig allegedly for causing “irreparable damage and tremendous prejudice to the City Government” when Maandig who was then acting as Officer-in-Charge of the City Legal Office “signed and officially came out with a legal opinion that is contradicting the city mayor’s order.”

The order that the city mayor was referring to is the Executive Order No. 2008CGJ-39 that defines and mandates the route to be followed by the Public Utility Jeepney (PUJ) vehicles entering the city from the East and providing penalties for violation thereof.

Jaraula contends that Maandig knew of the existence of EO 2008CGJ-39 that was distributed a week earlier than when the legal opinion signed by the assistant city legal officer came out.

But Maandig said Jaraula should have first placed him under investigation and given him his constitutional right to procedural due process before suspending him.

He said the Civil Service has also outlined the procedures to take before any civil service career officer can be placed under disciplinary sanctions.

“And Mayor Jaraula is a lawyer himself, he should know,” he said.

Maandig said he was just doing his job of rendering a legal opinion that was asked of him by City Hall.

He said and that he was only exercising his “professional judgment” as part of his public duties as then acting officer-in-charge of the City Legal Office.

“Besides, the city mayor is not bound with my legal opinion,” he said.

Maandig likened the situation to a trial court judge whose judgment is questioned yet cannot be sanctioned for rendering such a judgment unless gross ignorance of the law is proven.

He said what is attacked in situations like legal opinions and judgements are the questioned judgments and not the one who made the legal opinion or judgment.

“It is an error of judgment and appreciation of facts but not sanctions like in my case,” he said.

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Written by admin · Filed Under Cagayan de Oro