DESPITE objections from opposition councilors, the Cebu City Council approved last week the resolution recognizing the authority and validity of the compromise agreement that Mayor Tomas Osmeña entered over the case filed by Romulo Torres.
The resolution also provides that the authority granted to Osmeña to sign the compromise agreement dated Jan. 11, 2019, as provided under Sangguniang Panlungsod (SP) Resolution 14-0598-2018, cannot extend to any other actions of the local chief executive pertaining to the case.
Opposition councilors, however, said the move in the resolution was moot.
Last October, the council approved with five abstentions from opposition councilors SP Resolution 14-0598-2018, requesting Osmeña to negotiate two cases involving lots at the South Road Properties (SRP).
The authority earlier granted to Osmeña under SP Resolution 14-0598-2018 cannot be used to amend or revoke the provision of the compromise and any and all documents, agreements, settlements, transactions or actions in relation to the cases involving the SRP and any sale, lease, transfer, disposition or any action pertaining to the property should have a specific and separate approval from the council.
In a separate resolution, the council, with objections from the opposition, also approved a measure affirming and confirming that the negotiated sales on installment in 2015 to SM Prime Holdings Inc., and Ayala Cebu Holdings Inc. and Filinvest Land Inc. are deemed void.
The two resolutions, which were approved last May 21, 2019 with both 9-6 votes, were authored by Councilor Sisinio Andales of Barug Osmeña Pundok Kauswagan (BOPK).
During the deliberation, Councilor Raymond Garcia of the opposition Partido Barug said if the council approved Andales’s resolution, it would embarrass the legislative body because they’d be approving a compromise settlement of a decided case.
“If we indeed submit this resolution and approve it, this is very embarrassing to the Sangguniang Panlungsod, most especially the councilors of this Sanggunian, because we are acknowledging a compromise agreement of a case that has already been decided by the Court of Appeals (CA). If the principal is gone, so much more the accessory. How can we talk about the compromise agreement when the main case has already been dismissed?” Garcia said.
Garcia was referring to the decision of the 18th Division of the CA denying the appeal of Torres to stop the City from spending the proceeds from the sale of SRP lots in 2015 amounting to P8.35 billion.
Torres had filed in 2015 a petition for declaratory relief and injunction in his capacity as taxpayer from Barangay Basak San Nicolas.
In the decision promulgated last April 30, 2019, the CA also opted to solve the compromise agreement based on its merits since the actual case was already submitted for decision.
Councilors Jose Daluz III and Jocelyn Pesquera said the move in the resolution of Andales is also moot, considering that the court had decided on the case Torres filed.
“It’s not already viable because the entire case was already dismissed by the CA, so there is nothing to compromise or recognize,” Daluz said.
Pesquera also said the local chief executive was not a party to the case and had no right to enter into a compromise since it was the members of the council that Torres sued.
Apart from that, Pesquera said, they have no idea what the compromise was since they were not given copies of it.
“It has been the second time that we discussed about the compromise, but there was no copy of the compromise that was attached to our records in the council. It’s as if we are all blind on what has been stated in that compromise agreement,” she said.
In response, Councilor Margarita Osmeña said the resolution only says the council cannot extend its authorization given to the mayor to another action.
“It means that any other compromise should go back to the council. It’s as simple as that, unless there is more on the legal side. So it just stops there. If the compromise was reached or not, any deviation, amendment or change will have to come back to the council because the authorization was only given up to that compromise,” she said.