By Ade S. Fajardo

In August 2018, Overall Deputy Ombudsman Arthur Carandang was ordered dismissed from the service.

It was the Office of the President that issued the dismissal order despite prevailing jurisprudence at the time that the president has no power to dismiss a deputy ombudsman.

The ombudsman, and by extension his or her deputies, are released from changes in political winds by constitutional design. This is to ensure independence in the discharge of their principal function of combatting corruption in government offices.

***

Carandang gained headlines after he disclosed the alleged bank transactions of former President Rodrigo Duterte and his family.

Former Senator Trillanes had charged Duterte before the ombudsman for amassing illegal wealth hidden in several banks.

Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea signed the decision.

Aside from losing his office, Carandang suffered the ultimate cruelty against a civil servant.

His eligibility was canceled, his retirement benefits forfeited, and barred from taking civil service examinations.

He was also perpetually disqualified from holding public office.

***

This Duterte decision confirmed and amplified the fears expressed in the Supreme Court decision rendered in 2014 that nullified President Noynoy Aquino’s dismissal order against then deputy Ombudsman for the military Emilio Gonzales III.

In his ponencia, Justice Arturo Brion wrote that the Constitution saw it fit to insulate the Office of the Ombudsman from the pressures and influence of officialdom and partisan politics and from fear of external reprisal by making it an “independent” office.

Justice Brion added that subjecting the deputy ombudsman to discipline and removal by the president, whose own alter egos and officials in the Executive Department are subject to the ombudsman’s disciplinary authority, cannot but seriously place at risk the independence of the Office of the Ombudsman itself.

***

Rodrigo Duterte and his Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre had earlier caused the resignation of Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) Executive Director Julie Bacay-Abad.

The ostensive reason for the resignation was that the AMLC was not cooperating in the Duterte government’s fight against money laundering.

Abad was quickly replaced by Mel Racela, a San Beda alumnus like Duterte. It was under Racela that the AMLC halted its coordination with the ombudsman in looking into the Duterte bank transactions.

***

Carandang’s dismissal from the Office of the Ombudsman was implemented as soon as Samuel Martires replaced Conchita Carpio-Morales as head of office.

But now, the cast of characters has completely changed. Jesus Crispin Remulla is ombudsman and Ronel Buenaventura is the newly minted executive director of AMLC.

In the meantime, the committee on justice of the House of Representatives has all but wrapped up its hearings on the vice president’s declarations in her statements of net worth.

***

The justice committee has made random comparisons between AMLC records as previously affirmed by Carandang and the transactions as flagged and noted by the current AMLC director.

The entries are accurate to the last centavo.

This highlights the obvious. Anti-corruption bodies like the Ombudsman and the AMLC must never be politicized. Public accountability is primordial./WDJ