Ex-President Duterte cleared of misconduct

by Neil JaysoN servallos Philstar.com

MANILA — Former President Rodrigo Duterte has been acquitted by the Supreme Court (SC) in a simple misconduct case involving the demolition of a canal project in Davao City when he was mayor in 2010.

The project was initiated in 2006 by then Davao City first district representative Prospero Nograles, who filed the case before the Office of the Ombudsman. In a decision issued on Friday, June 30, the SC affirmed the 2011 ruling of the Court of Appeals (CA), which overturned the ombudsman’s order suspending Duterte, then city administrator Wendel Avisado, engineer Jose Gestuveo Jr. and legal officers Elmer Rano and Melchor Quitain as well as the chief of the city’s drainage and maintenance unit, Yusop Jimlani, for six months.

The SC denied the petition filed by the ombudsman and Nograles, who sought to overturn the CA’s decision.

The SC said Duterte and the officials did not commit misconduct when they ordered the demolition of the project, which caused floods that “did not affect the safety of the community.”

Nograles sought the opinion of then justice secretary Raul Gonzales, who said “the erection, construction, alteration, repair or demolition of structure requires a permit from the building official of the place where the structure is located.”

In denying Nograles and the ombudsman’s appeal, the SC said that while the project was not a nuisance, it noted several provisions of the revised National Building Code’s implementing rules and regulations that “could not be complied with, since the structure was a public edifice, and the demolition was carried out with the participation of the Department of Public Works and Highways.” Duterte, who was running for vice mayor at the time, was suspended weeks before the 2010 elections. n