CEBU CITY – The National Bureau of Investigation-Central Visayas (NBI 7) has filed charges against 11 officials of the Department of Public Works and Highways-Central Visayas (DPWH 7) and two other individuals on allegations that they falsified some documents to make it appear that some infrastructure projects in Cebu have been completed on time.
The 13 respondents were accused of violating Republic Act 3019 or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and the Revised Penal Code for falsification of documents and falsification by private individuals.
The respondents were DPWH Engineers Noel Pineda, Renult Ricardo, Danilo Villa Jr., Edelberto Fransisco, Connie Caballo, Aljoy Orcullo, Erwin Elegino, Marlon Marollano, Amelia Caracut, and Jocelyn Orcullo.
Also charged was Cecilia Ancajas, head of the accounting unit of the DPWH-Cebu 7th District Engineering Office (DEO).
Eric G. Ong and Clarita Ugay of private contractor Worldwide Builders are the two other respondents.
The NBI 7 on Tuesday, Oct. 11, filed the string of complaints before the Office of the Ombudsman for the Visayas after James Dellosa, former District Engineer of the DPWH 4th DEO, complained that his signatures in the disbursement vouchers for almost all of the infrastructure in the district were falsified.
The NBI 7 said that the signatures were allegedly falsified to make it appear that certain infrastructure projects were completed when they in fact remained incomplete.
Making the projects appear that they have been completed would allow the release of funds for the project and to save the contractor from paying penalties for the delayed or incomplete projects, the NBI 7 said.
The respondents denied the allegations against them when they were all subpoenaed and appeared before the NBI 7 regional headquarters with their legal counsels.
One of the infrastructure projects cited by Dellosa include the 2019 construction of the Barangay Kanghalo multi-purpose building in Dumanjug, Cebu amounting to around P1.8 million.
Dellosa said the project was not completed within 90 days as stipulated in the contract with the government.
"The expiry date for the project was on Sept. 17, 2019. Dellosa added that not only was the project not completed on time but the total work accomplished had not reached 90 percent even beyond his retirement in Feb. 7, 2020," the NBI-7 said.
All supporting documents for this particular project attached to the disbursement vouchers were sent to the NBI Questioned Documents Division in Manila for examination.
“The handwriting examiner concluded that 21 questioned documents and the standard/sample signatures of Engr. Dellosa were not written by one and the same person. In short the signatures appearing on the 21 supporting documents were forged,” the NBI 7 said.