Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales has ordered the filing of corruption charges against former House Speaker Prospero Nograles and several others in connection with the alleged anomalous disbursement of the multi-million-peso Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) of Misamis Oriental.
Nograles is set to face trial before the Sandiganbayan for three counts of violation of Section 3(e) of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act, one count of Malversation and two counts of malversation thru falsification of public documents.
Among those named as Nograles’ co-accused are his Chief of Staff Jennifer Karen Lagbas and Chief Public Affairs Officer Danilo Jamito as well as several other officials of the National Agri-business Corporation (NABCOR), National Livelihood Development Corporation (NLDC) and the Technology Resource Center (TRC).
Nograles is being charged for his supposed involvement in the PDAF of former MisOr representative Danilo Lagbas after documents showed that around R47 million was released as part of Lagbas’ PDAF.
Investigators were able to establish that listed beneficiaries never received any livelihood materials and were never shown any invoices or receipts.
After Lagbas’ death in 2008, Nograles continued the lawmaker’s supposed projects that were meant to provide assistance to several NGO’s which were eventually established as unqualified recipients.
“The chosen NGOs could not qualify for the grant of government funds since they failed to strictly comply with all the requirements needed in order to be considered eligible to implement government-funded projects,” the Ombudsman states. (Jun N. Ramirez)
