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Tuesday, January 28, 2003
Bayan accepts offer to head housing office
By Charles Raymond Maxey
DAVAO City Mayor Rodrigo R. Duterte formally offered the City Housing Office (CHO) to the militant group, a move most welcomed by the Bayan Muna.
And taking the cue from the pronouncements of Duterte, Joel Virador of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan or anybody from Bayan Muna will end up joining the mainstream of local governance by heading the CHO.
"I think they are seriously considering the idea of joining government," Duterte told reporters covering the City Hall beat.
Duterte had just emerged from a close-door meeting with Bayan Muna represetantive Davao City Councilor Angela Librado, lawyer Isagani Zarate and Virador where he reiterated his earlier offer for the left-leaning organization to head the CHO.
"We are seriously considering the offer of the mayor," Librado said.
Virador said they are now studying the proposal, but said it may not be necessarily that he will be the one to take the position.
"We can recommend somebody else," he said.
Monday morning's meeting between Duterte and Virador and his group somehow eased up the tension between the local chief executive and Bayan Muna after both parties engaged in a heated verbal clash over the city's housing problem.
The skirmish started when Duterte had ordered the demolition of squatters in Ecoland and along the Bucana River bank, a move that Bayan strongly opposed.
Irked by the negative remarks he got, Duterte was forced to offer the top CHO post to Virador or to anybody from the group who is interested.
And only last Sunday morning, the mayor was spewing fire in his television program, lambasting the left for "pretending to know when (in fact) you do not know."
The proposal for Bayan to head the city housing office seemed to have been sealed following the City Hall meeting, but Duterte maintained that whoever from the left who will head the CHO will be confined to do whatever is stipulated on his/her job description.
"When it comes to intelligence monitoring and national security matters, they will be taken out," Duterte emphasized.
"They will not have anything to do with security matters. They will be totally out," he added.
(January 28, 2003 issue)
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