The Commission on Elections First Division has ordered Carlo Gamban to step down as mayor of Silay City and relinquish his post to Jose "Oti" Montelibano who, it said, was the winner in the May 2004 polls with 138 votes more.

The COMELEC, in its resolution promulgated Feb. 1 and signed by COMELEC commissioners Resurreccion Borra and Romeo Brawner, said Gamban must cease and desist from performing the functions of mayor of Silay. "I feel very happy, since, from the very beginning I knew that I won that's why I pursued the case," Montelibano said.

"I feel vindicated…in life if you want something nice, you've got to work for it," he said.

Arroyo to switch on P8B plant
to boost Visayas power supply
BY CARLA GOMEZ

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo will lead this morning in the commissioning of the P8 billion Northern Negros Geothermal Power Plant in Mailum, Bago, the country's first merchant power plant to be operated under a deregulated power system.

The plant will also further boost the Philippines ranking as the world's second largest geothermal producer, and benefit 800,000 households in the Visayas grid, the Philippine National Oil Co.-- Energy Development Corp. said.

The president will arrive in Bacolod at 10 a.m. with Japanese Ambassador Ryuichiro Yamazaki, Energy Secretary Raphael Lotilla, Presidential Chief of Staff of Michael Defensor and Bacolod Rep. Monico Puentevella.

Teacher faces
rape charges
BY DONALYN GUERRERO

The Bacolod police will file today charges for rape and acts of lasciviousness against an elementary school teacher who allegedly molested and raped his students in a school compound in Bacolod City, last year.

SPO4 Nemia Cuzon, head of the Bacolod Women and Children Concern's Desk, yesterday said they will file the charges before the City Prosecutor's Office against the teacher, whose name is being withheld by the police, based on the complaints of the two complainants, aged 12 and 13.

Cuzon said the 13-year-old complainant told her the suspect raped her in the school compound, while the 12-year-old claimed the teacher touched her private parts in June 2006. She said three other complainants claimed the suspect molested them, but they haven't executed their affidavits.