12 December 2011 To: Board of Veterans Appeal Department of Veterans Affairs Regional Office 1501 Roxas Blvd.

1302 Pasay City, Philippines Letter of Appeal

Subject:

Comes now before this Honorable Office, the undersigned appellant, LAGUINDAB A. CASANGOAN, by himself, most respecfully alleges the following: That herein appellant would like to appeal the decision rendered by the Honorable Office, the disapproval of his claims finding that the herein appellant has no legal entitlement to one-time payment from the Filipino Veterans Equity Compensation Fund on the following ground: a) On the basis of the field examiner who interviewed the herein appellant, the former was concluded that the latter, due to inconsistencies in addressing the questions as pertaining to his pertinent service information and other details of claimed military service, was not allegedly the subject veteran; b) The signatures affixed by the herein appellant and the signature appears in the original military records was not the same. In the light of the foregoing, there are substantial reasons why such inconsistencies and other defects of the appellant may be considered by this Honorable Office of the Board of Veterans Appeal which are as follows: First, herein appellant would like to controvert the issue particularly as to the identity of the veteran, Laguindab A. Casangoan and the herein appellant refers to one and the same person which the basis is the identification document submitted/presented by himself before this Honorable Officeof the Veterans Affairs. The identification documents such as the Postal ID, Senior Citizen ID and the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Clearance were all genuine because they were issued by reliable issuing office or government office, by which they were never been tarnished or degraded its integrity. All the identification documents presented before this Honorable Office, in support of his claims, cannot be secured by anyone without first complying their imposed requisites to establish ones true identity, otherwise all of them are faked and secured only for ill will or motive.

Second, as pertains with the inconsistencies of the appellant in addressing the questions asked by the field examiner who conducted the spot interview, taking into consideration that the only dialect known by the appellant is Maranaw and a little Visayan dialect, and the language used during interview was Visayan dialect which there were difficulties of grasping those questions been asked, moreover, due to his aging, herein appellant had already diminished, not only his memory, but also his hearing capacity which the examiner did not relax on such deficiencies the appellants have and merely concluded base on his personal whims. For clarification of the foregoing, it was not true that the herein appellant has been failed to give even a single detail of his service information, the truth of the matter was the latter has gave, althought little details of information connected from his military service, unfortunately, the examiner was not fully satisfied and did not considered such little information and concluded against the appellants favor.

Lastly, as pertains with the alleged incomparison of the signature affixed by the herein appellant and the signature appears in the original copy of military record can be reconsidered by the Honorable Offive of Borad of the Veterans Appeal considering the fact that there are some factors that affecting the signature affixed by a person such as the health condition and the position of the person affixing signature, and one instance also is the gap of years the signature executed or affixed is morethan five years ago and the signature affixed at present will appear some difference pertaining the stroke loops and depth of the same which the expert signature examiner can only be the one to determine whether or not the same belongs to one person, thus, the same should not also be used as the basis of disapproval since there is no supporting evaluation done by an expert questioned document examiner. Wherefore, Herein appellant respecfully prays before the Honorable Office of Board of Veterans Appeal that the above premises be reconsidered, and likewise praying that appellant shall give a chance to enjoy the said claims even in his twilight years in order to compensate what he shared in the present freedom we had.

Respecfully yours,

LAGUINDAB A CASANGOAN Veteran / Appellant