FORMER Department of Public Works public information officer Felipe Q. Atalig last week filed a request for a status conference hearing on his opposition to the CNMI government’s motion to dismiss his petition for a judicial review of DPW’s termination of his employment.
Atalig, who has been filing his petitions pro se or on one’s own behalf, told the Superior Court that he is making the request because he is 83 years old and his health is deteriorating.
He is following up on the status of the case, which includes a pending motion that was taken under advisement.
DPW Secretary James Ada terminated Atalig in March 2018 for sexual harassment.
Atalig said he merely put his hand into an engineer’s pocket to “demonstrate a point” during an argument.
The engineer alleged that Atalig touched him inappropriately.
In his petition for judicial review, Atalig said his action “might have warranted a verbal reprimand,” but it was used “as pretext for his termination.”
He said “the real reason for his termination was as ongoing power struggle” between him and one of DPW’s directors.
Atalig also mentioned Attorney General Edward Manibusan’s advice to the DPW secretary that “until criminal charges are filed, Mr. Atalig must remain on the payroll (and further that) given the nature of the allegation against him, it would be proper for him to be suspended with pay or placed on administrative leave with pay during the notice of period. At such time as criminal charges are filed, his status may be moved to suspension without pay.”
On Oct. 8, 2020, the Commonwealth filed a motion to dismiss Atalig’s petition for judicial review, saying that the petitioner missed the court’s deadline in filing his petition, which “included insufficient defense and immaterial matters.”
On Nov. 2, 2020, Atalig filed an opposition to the Commonwealth’s motion to dismiss his petition saying that 1) he had satisfied pleading requirements for petition for judicial review, 2) the respondent’s arguments were misplaced, and 3) the government’s decision to terminate him was arbitrary and capricious.
Atalig told the court that he has been denied his paychecks from May 4, 2018 to the present.
“Such complete disregard of the Office of Attorney General’s counsel illustrates DPW’s concerted effort to accomplish their modus operandi of retaliation by electing termination without proper consideration,” Atalig said.
On Dec. 4, 2020, the Commonwealth filed a motion to strike the petitioner’s opposition to the government’s motion to dismiss the petition for judicial review.
According to the government, because Atalig missed the extended deadline, “the entire Opposition to Motion to Dismiss, is improperly before the Court and should be stricken as it was filed three days past the stipulated deadline.”
On March 17, 2021, Associate Judge Wesley Bogdan issued an order denying the Commonwealth’s motion to strike Atalig’s opposition, stating that the “Commonwealth has not demonstrated a sufficient showing of prejudice in support of its motion.”
The judge noted that because Atalig missed the deadline “during the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic and the Guma’ Hustisia closures (and during the use of confusing temporary courthouse facilities and filing locations), this Court believes that striking the Opposition is disproportionate sanction and too drastic of a remedy.”
In an interview, Atalig said it has been three years that he has been waiting to be paid what he believes is owed to him. “I have never been charged, never convicted, yet they denied me my salary. I am too old already and sick,” he added.
Atalig was a former member of the Marianas District Legislature and the Congress of Micronesia, and was a delegate to the NMI’s first constitutional convention in 1976.
Felipe Q. Atalig
