CEBU Gov. Hilario Davide III said he will sign this week the contract for the P1.3-billion Provincial Resource Center despite Vice Gov. Agnes Magpale’s ruling that he lacked votes for a Provincial Board (PB) approval.
Magpale had said the PB measure that sought to grant Davide approval did not get the required number of votes.
Davide, basing it on a 2008 Supreme Court en banc decision, said Wednesday that seeking PB authority to enter into a contract with the winning bidder that will construct the proposed 20-story facility is no longer necessary since the project was “already identified and specified with sufficient detail” under an approved appropriation ordinance in June 2018.
“We will proceed. The PB, the vice governor, already ruled on the voting and, per the DILG (Department of the Interior and Local Government), there was no majority. But, for me, there is an appropriation ordinance that already covers the project so, pursuant to the ruling of that Quisumbing vs Garcia case, I can proceed even without the authority of the PB,” Davide insisted.
“I think (I will sign) within this week,” he said, adding that the contract is ready.
Davide said the project is expected to break ground in February or before the election ban on public works from March 29 to May 12.
Meanwhile, lawyer Ian Lucero of the DILG 7, said that, unless an approved appropriation ordinance already contains in sufficient detail the project and cost of a capital outlay, the local chief executive will still need further authorization from the PB.
(The report published in the SunStar Cebu Jan. 23, 2019 issue inadvertently omitted the phrase “identified and specified sufficient detail” as a requirement for appropriation ordinances that no longer need further authorization from the body concerned.)
This sufficiency requirement, Lucero said, must be met first.