Your honors,
I am not a vendor. I am a media person trying to do his duty of speaking the truth to those in power on behalf of the powerless who, in the instant case, are those that will be negatively impacted by the proposed revised market code.
One of government’s major reasons for existence is to provide the public with basic social services, among them a public market. Not a mall, not a commercial hub, but a public market for those who do not have the wherewithal to do business in the financially rarified atmosphere of a mall or high-end commercial hub.
For the market to be essentially public, it must be under the supervision and control of the local government. In case of a joint venture, the control must also be joint. In no case should control be handed over to the private business partner because then it is no longer a joint venture but the takeover of a public utility by a private entity.
The proposed revised market code is stipulated in the JVA (joint venture agreement) as a condition for the City to enjoy its share of the revenues of a new Carbon. As worded, the revision clearly puts Carbon under the control of the City’s private partner.
A joint venture must stipulate for joint-everything. This means that sharing of revenues/profits should be proportionate to the partners’ percentage share of capital, with control clearly in the hands of the partner with the bigger share of capital.
There was no valuation of capital contributions to the joint venture but it can be safely assumed the City is putting more capital into the project than Megawide. The City should, therefore, be controlling partner not only because it is sound business practice but also and more so because responsible and responsive governance demands it.
Ergo, the stipulation in the JVA that requires the City to revise the market code in their favor effectively privatizes Carbon market. Through the revised market code Cebu City LGU (local government unit) cedes control over to Megawide, unreasonably putting Carbon market’s stakeholders at a great financial disadvantage.
Carbon has been Cebu’s central market which happens to be located in Cebu City. By privatizing it, the City deprives small ambulant vendors of a place to sell, deprives small farmer-producers of an outlet for their agricultural products and manufactured goods. Most critical of all, it deprives lower and middle class Cebuanos of affordable food staples and basic commodities.
Moreover, in privatizing Carbon Cebu loses a heritage site that has for decades seen small vendors succeed in housing, feeding, and educating their families. It needs some cleaning up and a healthy dose of sanitizing. It also needs a good deal of orderliness. But all these can come basically by expanding its sales area and not by reducing it and converting it into a world-class mall and commercial hub.
Parents normally pay extra care and attention to a handicapped child. In the Carbon family, the handicapped children are ambulant vendors, small farmers and producers, and cash-strapped Cebuanos. You are the parents who alone can give them the extra care and attention they need to survive the makalilisang financial challenges they are now facing.
Have a heart, your honors. In the name of everything human and Christian I beg you not to allow them to be crushed by the heartless vagaries of business for profit.
Thank you.
(My speech at the public hearing on the proposed revised market code during the regular session of the Cebu City Council on Wednesday, May 3, 2023)