By NORA SORIÑO
GSD-Iligan Bureau
and HERMIE ARCILLA
Contributor
ILIGAN City-- A city hall worker has accused Mayor Celso Regencia of gagging and throwing blows at him inside the local chief executive’s office at Seminary Drive in Palao, this city, on Valentine’s Day.
The alleged victim, 59-year-old Norbel Romares of Purok Dahlia, Acmac, Sta. Felomina, claimed that Regencia was furious and blamed him for the release of liquid wastes from the city’s Central Materials Recovery Facility (CMRF) in Bonbonon to the Dodiongan River.
A Feb. 18 certificate signed by M/Sgt. Steve Fernandez of Police Station 5 showed that Romares, a worker assigned at the CMRF, had the incident blottered.
Excerpts of the blotter showed Romares stating that he and five other people were summoned to Regencia’s Seminary Drive office. There, Regencia supposedly told Romares’s companions to go out.
Regencia is known to be holding office at Seminary Drive in Palao instead of Buhanginan Hills where most of the local government offices are.
Romares alleged that Regencia “boxed” him in the abdomen and chest while he was gagged with a masking tape.
He alleged that Regencia was also armed with a pistol which he supposedly took out at that time.
The mayor reportedly blew his top as he blamed the worker for polluting the Dodiongan River with liquid wastes from the facility.
