Negros Occidental Gov. Alfredo Marañon Jr. has filed a libel complaint against Pulupandan Mayor Magdaleno Peña before the Office of the City Prosecutor of Escalante City, and is asking that he pay P7 million in damages and other fees.

Marañon is demanding that Peña pay P2 million in moral damages, P2 million in exemplary damage, P1 million in compensatory damages, P1 million for litigation and necessary expenses, and attorney's fees of not less than P1 million.

In the affidavit-complaint filed April 3, a copy of which was furnished the DAILY STAR yesterday, Marañon said Peña, a relative and chief campaigner of Vice Governor Genaro Alvarez Jr. who is running against him for governor, has continually, relentlessly and publicly used the print and broadcast media to maliciously impute a crime, a vice or defect to discredit him.

Such acts of Peña have been done to impeach his honesty, virtue or reputation, or to hold him in public ridicule, and to discredit any popular vote in his favor, the governor said.

The governor said Peña showed his “hatred, revenge and evil motive” when he stated in a DAILY STAR article in its March 21 issue that “guv is 80 years old and delusions and dementia are indications of Alzheimer's”.

Marañon said he has kept his cool in the past, but to call him as incompetent person due to old age, which is false, and that his mental faculties are defective, has no relevancy to election issues…and was the last straw.

He said his colleagues in the local government can attest to his mental capacities. The sad specter of public embarrassment brought about by Peña's malicious and disparaging remarks is an ubiquitous presence that follows him whenever he discharges his official public and social functions, the governor said.

He said he “suffered sleepless nights, moral shock and besmirched reputation” and that his success as a businessman, in addition to being a public official, depends largely on having gained and nurtured a reputation for integrity, competence and intellectual acumen.

“ These were subjected (by Peña) to public ridicule, causing him to lose face among his peers,” Marañon added in his complaint.

He also cited a digitally-manipulated photo of him waving beside a kangaroo that was released to the media during a press conference of Peña at the Vice Governor's wing of the provincial Capitol in Bacolod City.

Marañon said Peña “was shameless and spineless to present the pictographic fakery to media as to pass it as genuine”.

An affidavit of Marcelo Briones, a Cadiz City resident, was also furnished the Office of the City Prosecutor of Escalante along with the complaint of the governor.

Briones said that, sometime on Feb. 15 and March 21, he came across two issues of the Visayan DAILY STAR with reports on the digitally-manipulated photo of the governor beside a kangaroo and of delusions and dementia.

Briones said he was shocked and dumbfounded, knowing the governor as an honest public servant with a reputation for integrity and probity beyond reproach.

Such uncalled for and defamatory publications definitely cast dishonor on the governor, Briones said.

Peña, when reached for comment, denied that he committed libel.

While libel is a minor offense punishable by a fine, the plunder complaint he will file against the governor for the purchase of overpriced sheep is punishable by life imprisonment with no bail, Peña said.

Marañon has denied that the sheep were overpriced.

The governor's failure to include the publisher of the newspaper where the alleged libelous acts were committed is also a material defect to the case that will be dismissed, Peña added.*CPG

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