The private complainant in the alleged overpriced Information Technology package case involving Mayor Monico Puentevella is questioning the role of City Administrator Rolando Villamor in the Mayor’s case.

Joselito Bayatan yesterday said he is wondering why Villamor claimed that he is not the lawyer of Puentevella, but he is talking about the merits and procedures of the case. They even announced to the media the procedures in the legal works in the case including the merits, he said.

Villamor, had earlier said, during a press conference, that he is only speaking as the City Administrator and the spokesman of Puentevella, and is not part of the Mayor’s defense panel.

“If we are to be conscious of professional ethics, the counsel of Puentevella are lawyers Ralph Sarmiento and Redemptor Peig,” Bayatan said.

Secondly, he (Villamor) claims that he is just the spokesperson, but keeps on talking about their strategy in the case. Truly, he is acting as a lawyer of Puentevella, he said.

Bayatan said this is an insult to professional ethics because, obviously, he is in government service and the complainant is also in the government represented by the People of the Philippines.

“If he (Villamor) quacks like a duck and talks like a duck, then he must be a duck,” Bayatan said.

Villamor could not be reached for comment as of press time last night.

Bayatan said Villamor is engaging himself in a conflict of interest, or violation of the Cannons of law practice.

Villamor had said that before the case was raffled, they filed a motion for judicial declaration of probable cause Thursday, and have asked that the 20-page motion they filed, be set for hearing this week.

Bayatan said the camp of Puentevella filed an “Omnibus motion for judicial determination of probable cause and to hold in abeyance the issuance of a warrant of arrest and/or to quash the warrant of arrest, and to dismiss the case outright and/or to drop accused Monico Puentevella in the case.”

He said they also asked the hearing be set on February 14 and later erased the date.

The case “People of the Philippines vs. Monico Puentevella, et. al.” was raffled off to the Fourth Division of the Sandiganbayan Friday, and docketed as case no SB 14CRM0108.

Bayatan said Sandiganbayan Fourth Division chairman Justice Gregory Ong with Justice Jose Hernandez and Justice Maria Cristina Cornejo will try the criminal case filed against Puentevella, Victorino Tirol Jr., former regional director of the Department of Education in Region 6, and Jessie Garcia, chairman of the board of Merryland Publishing Corp., the supplier of the IT packages in question.

The case involved the procurement of alleged overpriced IT (information technology) packages worth P26 million using Puentevella’s Priority Development Assistance Fund from 2002 to 2006 when he was a congressman.*CGS

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