COURT DEFERS ARRAIGNMENT OF TOLEDO CITY MAYOR

THE Sandiganbayan’s Third Division has moved to March 22 the arraignment for graft charges of Mayor John Henry Osmeña of Toledo City, Cebu pending the Court of Appeals’ decision on the petition for a restraining order he earlier filed. Osmeña was supposed to be arraigned on February 8. The ombudsman filed the cases in 2018 against Osmeña in connection with the alleged withholding of the release of the barangay’s ( village’s) real property tax shares for the last two quarters of 2014 and 2015 amounting to P17.7 million. He cited boundary dispute between the villages of Daanlungsod and Sangi in Toledo as basis for not releasing the tax shares.