By Walter J. Laurel, General Manager, PPCWD

Long post ahead, Bear with me.

The woman in the pink mask to the right of the lady holding the bicycle is Ms. Maria Fe Pablico, Administrative Department Manager of Puerto Princesa City Water District, she aspired to be the next General Manager of our water district by lobbying with the elders of her fraternity but she was declined by the City Mayor. Wrong move, she should have lobbied with the appointing authority for the General Manager which is the Board of Directors. Before the selection process for the position of General Manager of Puerto Princesa City Water District, she, along with other three officers of PPCWD, lobbied also to an incoming Director not to vote for my appointment as GM by besmirching my reputation as corrupt employee; she was not persuaded and instead observed the selection process and look at the background of the person they are referring to, the Director eventually see the real person I am and we became friends.

You might ask, why am I posting this. The truth of the matter is, she is the Overall Coordinator for the Fun Ride for World Water Day celebration organized by Puerto Princesa City Water District which did push through because of surge in number of Covid-19 cases in Puerto Princesa City but the distribution of jerseys and prizes for the raffle draw did push through. What is the significance of this picture? Since she is the Overall Coordinator for the World Water Day celebration, she, along with all working committee members planned all the activities related to the celebration and fun ride is just one among the activities. They recommended to ask for sponsorship from our suppliers for the prized of the raffle draw and some of the cost of the jersey, in exchange, the name of the sponsors will be printed on the jersey. I signed the request for sponsorship with good faith that it is beneficial to the agency. Two years after the cancelled fun ride, she filed a case for Grave Misconduct, Conduct prejudicial to the best interest of the service, graft and corruption (violation of RA 6713) and criminal case for malversation of public funds. Two other employees of PPCWD who are part of the working committee in which she is the overall coordinator was impleaded in the case, Ms. Gemma Mariquina and Ms. Beverlyn Santino.

After submission of pleadings and clarificatory hearing, the Office of the Ombudsman issued a ruling: ALL CASES AGAINST US WERE DISMISSED for lack of merit and absence of all elements constituting the violations cited. There was no corruption and intent to violate the law and respondent Laurel or his family did not benefit from such sponsorship. I do not even have the knowledge of what items were sponsored by the companies, I only got to know that Photovoltaic Solar Centre is the one who sponsored the bicycle which is the grand prize for the raffle draw when I reviewed the pleadings prepared by our lawyer, the information is from Ms. Mariquina and Ms. Santino. It was Ms. Pablico that awarded and has the custody of the prizes yet she filed cases for malversation. The Office of the Ombudsman however find me guilty for Simple Misconduct for signing the solicitation letter even how noble the purpose was, there was a circular from the Commission on Good Governance for Government Corporations prohibiting such activity, as the person who signed the same, I am liable for such infraction. I am not aware of such circular but since I did sign the request for sponsorship or solicitation, I am accountable for such act hence, I fully accept the consequence of my action. I did not initiate the solicitation but I did not practice prudence when I signed the same so I am guilty of Simple Misconduct. I wrote a letter to the Board of Directors that I will not appeal the decision of the Office of the Ombudsman and want to serve the suspension so that I can go back to work.

There are requests for interviews from different media outlets but I politely declined all of it since I have not made up my mind on how will I respond to the ruling of the Ombudsman. My enemies who badly want and drooling for the position of General Manager, through dummy facebook accounts sent the disposition portion of the ruling to different media outlets and they also commented on the said post, as narrated by my colleagues, very nasty posts but all of it did not affect me because I never read them and friends who are very concerned with the posts send screenshots to me. I told them to stop sending it to me because I am not interested. Most of the people who commented badly on the post of Palawan News and Bandera News have bad blood against my leadership because they were affected by the change I am instituting in this beloved water district of ours. Two of them has a case of qualified theft but I did not pursue the case and instead asked them to resign for the honor of their family names who served PPCWD for a very long time.

So if you can read up this portion of my post, you have now a sort of knowledge on the dynamics of our organization. In my time as General Manager, countless awards and citations has been given to the agency, we become a benchmarking destination for government offices in our PRIME-HRM program and water districts alike. I committed a lapse in judgement by trusting the Overall Coordinator for World Water Day celebration in 2021, it is a lesson I learned the hard way and I have to pay for it by taking a vacation and spending more time with my family in the next 31 days. See you soon my beloved PPCWD.