Moreno is using the report, prepared by State Auditor Allan Gajudo, an engineer; Technical Audit Specialist Nilo Confessor, also an engineer; and Leonardo Ruiz Jr., head of the Commission on Audit (COA) inspection division, to get the agency to recall
a previously-issued notice of disallowance.

She has also attached the report to a motion for reconsideration she filed before the Office of the Ombudsman-Visayas that remains pending, despite the Sandiganbayan’s issuance of a warrant of arrest last week.

The inspection report is dated Oct. 23, 2009 and covered the delivery of 311 sheets of aluminum composite panel or cladding sheets, with metal framing.

The materials were bought from Diamond Interior Industries Corp., the same firm that supplied cladding materials for the CICC.

“After re-evaluation and consideration, particularly on the method of installation, the subject materials were found to be completely delivered,” the report said.

The Office of the Ombudsman-Visayas filed the anti-graft case against Moreno before the Sandiganbayan last month, alleging that the purchase contract was awarded to the supplier without proper bidding.

The case impleaded Moreno and the town’s bids and awards committee—Pepito Manguilimotan, Nonela Villehas, Marilyn Flordeliza, Gertrudes Ababon, John Lim, Orven Nengasca and Emilia Celis.

With the exemption of Lim, who is out of town on a family emergency, they all posted bail with Moreno last Dec. 23.

Moreno and the impleaded officials, according to the resolution prepared by Graft Investigator Edsel Ensomo, gave “unwarranted benefit, advantage or preference over other qualified bidders.”

“It is clear to us that the bidding process, which purportedly led to the award of the contract, had been rigged from the very beginning to do away with the usual public bidding,” the resolution read.

But Moreno, in an interview, denied the allegation. She said a bidding was conducted and attracted three suppliers. Of the three, she said, Diamond Interior Industries Corp. gave the most advantageous quotation.

She said the bidding took place when cladding was still a relatively new technology in Cebu, adding that this was why the turnout in the bidding wasn’t good.

She lamented that the anti-graft office filed the case with the Sandiganbayan despite the fact that they lodged a motion for reconsideration against Ensomo’s resolution.

“We did not receive any notice that the motion had been denied, so we were surprised when we learned that an arrest warrant was already issued,” she said.

She clarified that the case did not involve missing funds or any allegations that they pocketed money, adding that the charge simply focuses on an alleged lapse in the bidding process.

“There is no damage to the government and the COA re-inspection report shows that,” she stressed.