TACLOBAN CITY– A police officer assigned in Limasawa town, Southern Leyte was relieved from his post after he was accused to have ‘planted’ a pack of cigarette against a sari-sari store owner.

The town of Limasawa is one of the few local governments in Eastern Visayas that strictly imposes a prohibition on the selling of cigarettes and other tobacco products as mandated under Republic Act 9211(Tobacco Regulation Act of 2003).

Corporal Ruel Arot was caught on a video reportedly planting a pack of cigarettes at the store owned by Ran-ran Salomon in Barangay Magallanes at about 2 pm on Saturday (Sept. 30).

The sacking of Arot, who is from Maasin City but is assigned at the historic town of Limasawa, was made by Southern Leyte police provincial director Col. Hector Enage.
“(The) relief of the said police officer is to give way to an investigation by the Provincial Office in order to shed light on what really transpired during the incident,” the press statement issued by the police provincial office said on Saturday.

Arot was temporarily assigned at the Provincial Holding and Accounting unit of the provincial police office in Maasin.

The same statement also said that if there is evidence against the relieved police officer, he could be administratively or criminally charged.

But Arot, in a post on his social media account, denied the allegation against him.
He said that, for one, it was ‘public knowledge’ in Magallanes that Salomon has been selling cigarettes in his store despite of the prohibition imposed by the local government.

The police officer added that prior to the incident, he had asked his asset to buy the pack of cigarettes, the one described by Salomon as the planted item.

“(And) previously I already reprimanded Salomon why he kept on selling cigarettes (despite of the prohibition),” Arot said.

Arot also denied that he is an ‘abusive’ police officer saying that he did not stop Salomon from taking a video of him during that time.

“And I did not force you to sign the citation ticket nor physically hurt you,” he said, addressing Salomon. (JOEY A. GABIETA)

TACLOBAN CITY – A tertiary school run by the city government of Ormoc has started its pioneering classes with 390 students enrolled in four four-year courses.

Of these enrolled students, 379 of them are from this city with the remaining students coming from its neighboring towns.

The school, Ormoc Community College (OCC), offers office administration, social work, business administration, and public administration.

Most of the students are enrolled in social work (143) and business administration (113).
The courses were offered by the OCC was based on the result of an earlier survey conducted by the city government under Mayor Lucy Torres Gomez.

Mayor Gomez said that they are not offering too many courses instead will only offer those that are competitive and provides job opportunities.

City residents who are enrolled at the OCC are all scholars while those who came from neighboring towns have to pay their tuitions.

Prior to the opening of the OCC, the city government had visited several local government units running their own colleges like the municipality of Abuyog where they had a benchmarking and the Valenzuela City where they forged a sisterhood agreement.
(ROEL T. AMAZONA)

ORMOC CITY-A long-time misunderstanding between two siblings resulted in the gruesome death of one of them in Gamay, Northern Samar.

Based on the report of the local police, the incident happened at about 6:30 pm on Sept.26 between Julian Longcop,50, and his younger sibling, Danilo,38, in Barangay Cabarasan in the said town.

An initial investigation conducted by the local police disclosed that the victim and the suspect had a long-standing misunderstanding due to the behavior of the victim.

Accordingly, the victim was very temperamental and is suspected to be suffering from mental illness.

The suspect told responding police that his younger brother was a pervert and had even tried to make a pass with his wife which led to a heated argument between the two.

The elder Longcop drew a bladed weapon, locally known as ‘sundang’ and chased his younger brother and hacked him several times.

The victim was brought to Gamay District Hospital where he was declared as dead on arrival.
(ROBERT DEJON)