Sandiganbayan upholds dismissal of graft vs. ex-GSIS head Winston Garcia

The Second Division of the anti-graft court Sandiganbayan has upheld its earlier ruling dismissing the graft case against former Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) president and general manager Winston Garcia due to the Office of the Ombudsman’s inordinate delay in the investigation and filing of the case.

In a seven-page resolution, the court said the prosecution failed to present any substantial argument that would warrant the reversal of the court’s March 17, 2016 ruling.

“A painstaking evaluation of the Motion for Reconsideration ineluctably yields the conclusion that no substantial argument was advanced therein by the prosecution to justify its assertion that no vexatious, capricious, or oppressive delay occurred in this case, or that there is probable cause against all the accused,” the resolution penned by Second Division chairman Teresita Diaz-Baldos read.

Associate Justices Napoleon Inoturan and Michael Frederick Musngi concurred in the ruling.

The court maintained that Garcia and the other respondents’ Constitutional right to speedy disposition of cases was violated when the Ombudsman sat down on the complaint for more than 10 years.

“Allowing the case to proceed beyond the ten-year period that it has lamentably dragged in the fact-finding and preliminary investigation stages would not only violate the constitutional mandate on speedy disposition of cases but would also work further prejudice on the accused who have to content with a case forever dangling over their heads,” the new ruling read.

Aside from Garcia, other respondents whose respective motions to dismiss the case were granted by the court were former GSIS vice president Enriqueta Disuanco, former Board of Trustees chairman Hermogenes Concepcion Jr. and former Board of Trustees members Elmer Bautista, Fulgencio Factoran Jr., Florino Ibañez, Reynaldo Palmiery, Ellenita Tumala-Martinez and Leonora Vasquez-De Jesus.

Filed by the Office of the Ombudsman in November last year, the graft case stemmed from the alleged anomalous awarding of a multi-million-peso electronic membership card (e-Card) project in 2004 allegedly without complying with the requirements and procedures set forth under Republic Act 9184 or the Government Procurement Reform Act.

The project, which the GSIS awarded to Union Bank of the Philippines, aimed at providing easier and paperless transactions for GSIS members in their application for and withdrawal of loans and benefits.

Based on the court’s records, the Commission on Audit (COA) filed a letter of complaint before the Ombudsman against Garcia and the other respondents over the alleged e-Card project anomaly on April 1, 2005.

The Ombudsman’s Field Investigation (FIO) finished its fact-finding investigation only in September 2011.

The court said there was no justification for such delay especially as it turned out that the FIO’s resolution “was based solely on the Commission on Audit Report which it already had in its possession since 2005.”

The court further noted that after the FIO turned over its report to the central office, it took the Ombudsman another four years to conduct a preliminary investigation and to issue a resolution finding probable cause to file the case.

The court dismissed the prosecution’s argument that the FIO investigation was halted after then Ombudsman Simeon Marcelo supposedly received a letter from the GSIS requesting for a deferment of any action on the COA report as the GSIS supposedly had a pending petition to nullify it before the Court of Appeals.

“Giving credence to this reason would be unwittingly dangerous for the Office of the Ombudsman because it only implies that it can be cowered into inaction,” the court said.

The Second Division further maintained that even if assuming that there was no inordinate delay in the filing of the case, the court still found no probable cause to hold Garcia and the other respondents on trial.

“It has not been shown how they gave unwarranted benefits, advantage or preference to Union Bank of the Philippines when the eCard project was awarded to it after the several other banks, to which invitations to submit proposals were sent, were unable to submit complete proposals,” the resolution read.

The court further dismissed the prosecution’s allegation that the contract was disadvantageous to the government.

“It cannot be imputed too that the Government was placed at a disadvantage because a Technical Committee evaluated the proposals, particularly their financial aspect, and it thereafter found the Cost Benefit Analysis of Union Bank to be the most advantageous to the GSIS,” the court said.

The court said the fact that the other banks did not complain of any partiality against them, as well as the absence of any Notice of Disallowance from COA, affirmed the assumption of regularity of the project.

“Most importantly, the subsequent Board validated the project, which to date, is very much in use,” the ruling read. —ALG, GMA News