CA denies Cortes plea

The appellate court sustained the Ombudsman’s finding that Cortes improperly designated Camilo S. Basaca Jr. as Officer-in-Charge of the CSWSO in July 2022 despite the latter’s failure to meet the qualification requirements under the Local Government Code (LGC) and the Civil Service Commission (CSC) rules.

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The CA ruled that, at the time of his designation, Basaca was serving as Executive Assistant II under a coterminous and primarily confidential appointment, which under the 2017 Omnibus Rules on Appointments and Other Human Resource Actions (ORAOHRA) disqualified him from being designated to a position that requires a permanent career appointment.

The court also agreed with the Ombudsman that Basaca did not meet the substantive qualifications for the CSWSO post, noting that his Bachelor of Science in Office Administration is not a course related to social work or sociology, and that he failed to sufficiently prove at least five years of social work experience as required by law.