PAGC chief apologizes over lack of 'delicadeza' for hiring son

Admitting she may have run afoul for violating the sense of delicadeza, the head of the Presidential Anti-Graft Commission (PAGC) apologized Monday for hiring relatives in her office. But PAGC Chairwoman Constancia de Guzman insisted there was no nepotism, saying getting her son as executive assistant, and his girlfriend as legal head, were based on merit. “I offer my apologies if I appeared to lack a sense of delicadeza. But this much I can tell you, I did not do it to benefit my relatives," De Guzman said in an interview on dzXL radio. But she insisted there was nothing illegal in taking in her son as a confidential assistant whom she has “full trust and confidence." Newspaper columnist Jarius Bondoc earlier claimed De Guzman's son Reindl is her executive assistant while Reindl’s fiancée is executive director, the highest staffer. In his column, Bondoc also claimed De Guzman’s brother’s “inexperienced" son Aries Christian Posadas is paid P30,000-a-month as technical assistant. De Guzman said she did not have an employer-employee relationship with her nephew, adding the contract for his services was for P22,000 a month and not P30,000 as Bondoc claimed. For hiring her son, De Guzman said she had a problem with reviewing legal documents, and her son, according to her, has the legal background to do so. CSC requirements She even added that her son has been working as her executive assistant for at least two years now. According to her, the government allows officials to hire an executive assistant, so long as the one being hired meets the requirements of the Civil Service Commission. “Kung may pagkukulang man ako, siguro yung sa isyu po ng delicadeza. At the time I was moved by desire to get someone capable and can be trusted to help me govern well sa PAGC (If there was anything wrong with what I did, perhaps it was on the issue of delicadeza. But at the time I was moved by the desire to get someone capable to help me govern the PAGC well)," she said. She said she needed an executive assistant because she had been overloaded, personally handling even the petty cash vouchers. De Guzman also admitted getting the girlfriend of her son as head of the PAGC’s legal department. “Pero…nakabatay pa sa kakayanan ng tao, walang nepotismo doon (But that was based on merit, there was no nepotism there)," she said. Besides, she said that if there was nepotism, she would have had more relatives working in PAGC long ago. “I welcome any investigation into this issue, because I know I did not commit any abuses," she said.- GMANews.TV