Saturday, November 15, 2008 ‘Public use’ may convince City
AS LONG as Province-owned lots in Cebu City are developed for the use of government offices, City Hall will not delay the processing of any application from the Capitol for building permits, an official said.
City Administrator Francisco Fernandez said yesterday they have no objection to any construction or development of any provincial lot in the city, as long as these are for public use.
This, as City Building Official Josefa Ylanan confirmed that the Capitol’s application for a building permit for the new Cebu Provincial Police Office (CPPO) building in Barangay Lahug had been pending for several months, until Acting Mayor Michael Rama approved it last month.
She said that the application for a building permit was submitted to the office of Mayor-on-Leave Tomas Osmeña sometime in May, but the latter did not sign it.
When she endorsed the application to the office of Acting Mayor Rama for approval, while Osmeña was in the US for surgery last month, Rama approved the application.
“I submitted it to the office of Mayor Osmeña in the middle of this year but he did not sign it. There was no reason given. So when he left for the US and gave instructions that all applications for building permits should be endorsed to Acting Mayor Rama, I submitted all applications to him but I briefed him that Mayor Osmeña did not sign the Capitol’s application,” Ylanan said.
Challenge
Also yesterday, former Cebu City Mayor Alvin Garcia questioned why Osmeña tried to drag him into the dispute over the Capitol’s Ciudad joint venture project.
Garcia said he knows nothing about the personalities whom the mayor suspected of being involved in the proposed project.
In a text message to reporters, Osmeña said that “people behind the Ciudad project are suspected to be involved with many anomalies of (Alvin) Garcia.”
During yesterday’s “Tapok-tapok sa Kia” forum, however, Garcia challenged the mayor to name those “personalities” behind the project.
Garcia said he was surprised why Osmeña started to link him to the Ciudad project.
In the previous months, Garcia pointed out, the mayor’s opposition to the project was not because of him but the City and Capitol’s misunderstanding.
However, the former mayor said he does not wish to dignify the mayor’s statement.
Governor Garcia earlier expressed support for the proposal of Provincial Board (PB) Member Victor Maambong to ask the City to reconsider its decision to freeze new development projects along Gov. Cuenco Ave. in Barangay Banilad.
No pushover
But in a text message sent from Houston, Texas, Osmeña said the governor, not any of the PB members, should be the one to renegotiate with the acting mayor.
“The acting mayor should demand that the governor deal with him directly as chief executive instead of dealing with those lowly board members who have no authority to negotiate,” he said. “The Province made fun of the City Council by reneging on the land swap. They think the vice mayor is a pushover? I don’t think so.”
As to the CPPO building, Ylanan of the Office of the Building Official said that before the application could be endorsed, the contractor discussed the matter with the acting mayor.
“When I told him that it was not signed by Mayor Osmeña, he said he will review it,” she continued, adding that the signed permit was later returned to her office.
Rama, who is in Bangkok, Thailand for a workshop, could not be reached for comment.
Other than the CPPO building permit, the Capitol has no other pending application at City Hall.
Condition
For his part, City Administrator Francisco Fernandez said there are no instructions from Osmeña not to approve the building permit for the CPPO building.
“Wala kuno pirmahi ni Mayor Tom pero wala sad gi-disapprove. Gi-consider lang na pending ang application. But if you’re asking me if I was given instructions not to approve, Mayor Tom never ordered me to disapprove that. As far as I know, he has no objection on construction by the Province as long as it’s for public use,” Fernandez said.
He further said that Osmeña’s policy has always been that all provincial properties in the city should be used for public services and not for any commercial purpose.
This is the reason the City Government is opposing moves by the Capitol to evict the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority from the Province-owned land it is occupying, he added. (LCR/With GMD)
