Cagayan State U employees seek reversal of COA ruling on P27-M bonus

CAGAYAN, Philippines – Cagayan State University employees have filed a petition before the Supreme Court seeking the reversal of a Commission of Audit (COA) order for them to return the year-end incentive they received in December 2014.

The incentive was granted through Special Order 2014-736 issued by Dr Romeo Quilang, who was then the university president.

In their petition, the CSU employees argued that COA’s Notice of Finality of Decision (NDF) dated August 16  is “gravely abusive” as it declared as final its disallowance of an incentive and ordered the petitioners to pay back the amount involved – a total of P27 million or P40,0000 per employee – without giving them enough to make an appeal. 

The petitioners – represented by CSU professors Fr Ranhilio Aquino, who is also Dean of the San Beda College Graduate School of Law; and Pablo Narag – said the COA decision has “grossly and patently” ignored existing law and jurisprudence both on the disallowance and on the order to pay back the bonuses they received in 2014.

In an interview, Aquino said the case should have gone through the appeals process from the COA. He added that the employees were not given “personal notice” of the disallowance, giving them limited time to appeal. 

“The problem is we have been time-barred because we did not have personal notice,” Aquino said.

“It (Notice of Disallowance) was received in our behalf so the time to appeal has lapsed so our only remedy now is to go to the Supreme Court,”  Aquino added.

The petition also cited Casal vs Commision on Audit, Philippine Ports Authority vs Commision on Audit, and Benguet State University vs Commission on Audit.

Faculty members expressed their dismay over the incentive payback which, they claimed, they only learned when CSU officer-in-charge Mariden Ventura-Cauilan issued  a memorandum on August 30 asking them to pay immediately the amount to the university cashier.

 “We did not ask for the money and we received the incentive in good faith because there was a special order released,” one faculty member said.

Earlier, the University Faculty Association issued Resolution No. 003 series of 2016 adopting the petition for certiorari prepared by Aquino and Narag. – Rappler.com