KABUGAO, Apayao – Two criminal and graft charges filed against a number of National Commission on Indigenous Peoples–Cordillera (NCIP-CAR) and elders of the Kabugao ancestral domain were dismissed by the Office of the Ombudsman for gross violation of the rule against forum shopping.
In a 30-page consolidated resolution penned by Graft Investigation and Prosecution Officer III Maria Viviane Cacho-Calicdan and approved by Ombudsman Samuel Martires, it stated that when complaisant successively filed their complaints before other bodies with concurrent jurisdiction which took cognizance of the complaints, jurisdiction was already vested on said bodies and could no longer be transferred to the Ombudsman by virtue of a similar complaint.
The resolution pointed out that it is a horn book rule that jurisdiction is a matter of law where jurisdictions once acquired is not lost upon the instance of the parties but continuous until the case is terminated.
Records showed that complainants, together with other individuals, filed successive complaints involving the same respondents, NCIP-CAR officials and Kabugao elders, for the same cause of action before different bodies beginning with the NCIP where the Commission en banc denied the motion for reconsideration seeking the reversal of the issuance of the certification pre-condition for the project in favor of Pan Pacific Renewable Power Phils. Corp (PPRPPC) via consolidated resolution dated May 9, 2022.
This NCIP complaint was followed by identical complaints with the Office of the Provincial Prosecutor of Apayao. The said office dismissed the two complaints for lack of probable cause in resolutions both dated Junes 26, 2023.
Again, two identical complaints were filed against respondents on December 28, 2022 and January 25, 2023, respectively, with the Office of the Deputy Ombudsman for Luzon, another similar complaint with the Ombudsman Central Office filed on May 2, 2024 against the same respondents, only with the inclusion of NCIP Chairman as party respondent which is still pending preliminary investigation and administrative adjudication.
The consolidated resolution explained that complaints’ proclivity of filing complaints with different fora based on the same causes of action clearly violates the rule against forum shopping.
Further, the administrative complaints against the concerned NCIP-CAR and NCIP–Apayao officials were also dismissed by the said consolidated resolution.
“Considering the foregoing, this office has no recourse but to dismiss the present complaints,” the consolidated resolution dated September 24, 2024 stressed.
The complaints against the NCIP-CAR officials and the KAUGAL elders stemmed from the resolutions crafted by the Kabugao elders that endorsed the 150-megawatt Gened-1 hydroelectric project being proposed by PPRPPC and the signing of the appurtenant memorandum of agreement (MOA) for the said project where it was alleged that the signatures of the elders were falsified without sufficient basis. By Dexter A. See
