CEBU City Mayor Edgardo Labella ordered the stoppage of demolition on a private lot in Sitio La Guardia, Barangay Lahug, invoking the earlier agreement he had reached with the lot owners to move the date of demolition to March 31, 2020.
Labella, in a phone interview, said he was stunned that the demolition team moved to destroy houses last Wednesday, March 11.
Of the 60 houses in the area, the team was able to dismantle 10 houses.
A court order, which favored the family who owns the lot, scheduled the demolition on Friday, March 13.
The Wednesday demolition violated the court order, said Labella.
The mayor sent a task force to La Guardia to stop the demolition Thursday, March 12.
Labella said the property owners agreed to carry out the demolition on March 31. The residents, he said, will voluntarily leave the place after their children’s classes are over by the end of the month.
Robert Barquilla of the Mayor’s Task Force for Housing said he observed last Wednesday that the demolition personnel violated rules by not wearing proper identification cards and proper protective gear.
Labella said the City provided temporary shelter for the families whose houses were destroyed last Wednesday.
He tapped the Division for the Welfare of the Urban Poor to help in finding relocation sites for the affected families. (JCT)