Iloilo SK federation condemns town president’s attempted murder rap

By Joseph B.A. Marzan

The Panlalawigang Pederasayon ng Sangguniang Kabataan (PPSK) of Iloilo province on Monday condemned the involvement of a municipal SK president in a second district town who was recently involved in frustrated murder charges.

PPSK Iloilo’s legal consultant and former vice president, lawyer Bryan Eric Cerebo, said they were saddened by the shooting incident involving San Miguel town SK president Mikhail Tadifa.

Tadifa is the prime suspect in the shooting of 30-year-old Dyezrelle Malaygay, also from San Miguel.

The incident stemmed from a confrontation in the Facebook comments section regarding the town’s basketball league.

Cerebo said that this was the first time in the history of the province that a sitting SK president was involved in a murder-related offense.

“That is a sad state as of the moment. We have reformed the Sangguniang Kabataan supposedly to give new hope for the youth, to provide them better opportunities in the new SK Reform Law. This is an isolated case, because we have a lot of success stories here in the province of Iloilo,” Cerebo said.

“We call on [Tadifa] to cooperate with our justice system because we believe that there is a presumption of innocence and due process of law. We just hope that he cooperates with the processes because our justice system will help him,” he added.

Cerebo, a former SK municipal president of New Lucena, shared his experience with Tadifa, citing the latter’s curiosity as to the functions and mandates of the job as top SK official.

But the former also denied any knowledge of the latter’s relationships with the officials and youth of San Miguel.

“[Tadifa] is very interested and curious in his obligations as [SK municipal federation president] because several times, he had been seeking advice from us as to what programs and projects can he do in San Miguel. However, I don’t know his stature in San Miguel, and how his relationships there with officials,” he said.

As to sanctions against Tadifa, Cerebo explained that it would be the Sangguniang Bayan of San Miguel that would lay down sanctions against him, citing Section 18 of Republic Act No. 10742 (Sangguniang Kabataan Reform Act of 2015).

Section 18 provides that a town or city council which has jurisdiction over the SK official’s barangay may vote by a majority of all members to suspend them for 6 months or remove them from office.

Applicable grounds to Tadifa’s case, Cerebo opined, were either conviction of a crime of moral turpitude or abuse of authority.

Aside from this current attempted murder charge, Tadifa was also reported to have previous criminal records, including another attempted murder case as well as an illegal gambling case.

As of this writing, Tadifa remains on the run, while Malaygay’s mother told Bombo Radyo Iloilo on Monday that she is currently in stable condition.