Former Cagayan de Oro City Mayor Oscar Moreno on Sunday branded as “pure political harassment” the filling of graft and malversation charges against him before the Office of the Ombudsman over the alleged irregularities in the distribution P767.8-million cash aid to the poor families in the city at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2021.
“This is pure political harassment, may they fear I will come back in the next election,” said Moreno in a radio interview, adding that he will respond to the charges as soon as he gets the copy of the complaint.
Moreno insisted that there were no irregularities as the city government was just implementing the cash assistance program of the national government that provided them the list of beneficiaries in the city totaling to 223,000.
City councilor James Judith — who filed the complaint Friday — alleged that Moreno, former city administrator Teodoro Sabug-a and the office of former overseer Christopher Fabelo were liable for graft, falsification of public documents and technical malversation.
However, Moreno argued that there were no irregularities as they were able to implement the program which benefited almost 300,000 indigent families in the city.
He said after review of the 223,000 list provided by the Department of Social Welfare and Development, it found out that 100,000 of the listed beneficiaries were individuals, 50,000 families of two, 50,000 families of three and 80,000 families of four.
The guidelines set by the national government stated that members of the families of four were entitled to receive P1,000 each and Moreno said that the city government was able to return an excess amount of P150 million to the DSWD.