MANILA, Philippines - The regional office of the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) is looking into the possibility that the Eso-Nice bus that plunged into a cliff in Benguet province last week has a fake road worthiness certificate.

Federico Mandapat, DOTC's regional director in the Cordillera Administrative Region, said the Eso-Nice bus company has submitted a road worthiness certificate allegedly issued by the Land Transportation Office's central branch last July 13, 2010.

Mandapat said that the certificate was supposedly signed by Engr. Joel Donato of the North Motor Vehicle Inspection Center.

Donato, however, denied in a letter sent to Mandapat's office that he signed the road worthiness certificate.

Mandapat said that according to Donato, the certificate submitted by the Eso-Nice bus company should be "considered fake" by the regional DOTC office.

"He denied issuing any certification," Mandapat told ABS-CBN News.

The regional DOTC director, however, said that they would still have to check if the road worthiness certificate is really fake despite Donato's denial.

He said that the Eso-Nice bus company insists that the certificate is genuine.

The company's employees interviewed by ABS-CBN News alleged that the LTO Central Office denied that it issued the certificate to avoid being held liable for the tragic bus accident.

Forty-one people died after an Eso-Nice bus with body number 801 plunged into a 150-feet-deep cliff after its brakes failed past last August 18 along Sitio Amba-cuag, Barangay Banangan, Sablan, Benguet.

Mandapat said that if the road worthiness is proven fake, the DOTC will cancel its franchise and totally stop the bus company's operations. – Report from Andrea Diocares, ABS-CBN Baguio