GARGANTUAN REDUCTION OF TAX DEBT is the point of fact Cebu Vice Governor Glenn Soco and his party-mates are using to make noise over the issue.
From P1.218 billion to P211.56 million. Or, if the AI-assisted computation is correct, a reduction by 82.64 percent, or by more than one billion pesos.
That's how much the tax assessment on Apo Land and Quarry Corp. (ALQC) has been reduced by the compromise forged by Governor Pam Baricuatro
WAR IN CAPITOL A-COMING? Is Vice Guv Glenn "preparing for war?" Cebu Governor Pam Baricuatro asked her vice governor that blunt question in response Soco's comment about the compromise with ALQC.
"Because I am prepared for war," said Governor Pam at her press-con Wednesday, March 11, 2026, at the Capitol.
Surely not friendly. Combative even.
Far different from past images and sounds in social media, which had set off suspicion that former governor Gwen Garcia's and now Governor Pam's vice governor was about to switch affections, if not political camps.
Glenn and the rest of the Provincial Board are One-Cebu, Gwen Garcia's political party, which lost in a massive upset the governor's seat in the 2025 election. One Cebu became a headless chicken of sort and the person wielding the knife was Pam Baricuatro.
Initial niceties after the June 30, 2025 inaugural between Baricuatro and the elected board members made some people wonder if Gwen Garcia's loyalists wouldn't be deserting her camp.
WHAT GLENN SAID, DID THAT GOT PAM'S GOAT. The vice governor said at his press-con last March 6, 2026 the PB will review the compromise agreement between the Provincial Agreement and Apo Land and Quarry Corp. (ALQC).
Glenn Soco said the question of compromise should've been discussed first: was a deal necessary? Before even talking about reducing the amount of the tax, he said in effect, the board should've been consulted prior to the GBP-ALQC compromise.
To Guv Pam, Vice Guv Glenn was in effect accusing her and her aides of ill motive, like the administration was bribed to agree to the deal.
Worsening the implicit accusation of fraud was that VG Glenn called a press-con. Talking at a press-con appears to be more serious stuff than commenting in a post or blog.
Soco's press-con apparently triggered the "war" talk from the governor. Guv Pam, in an apparent Iraq-post-bombing mood, almost snarled: "Preparing for war? Because I am."
GLENN'S BEEF, THAT PB MEMBERS WEREN'T CONSULTED, NOT REFUTED. It still stands, supporting these assumptions:
-- Guv Pam must have thought she didn't have to consult board members while negotiating with ALQC and before presenting the compromise to the PB. Vice Guv Glenn complained about the absence of prior consultation.
-- Not looked into by media and not discussed by Guv Pam and Vice Guv Glenn is the actual status of the compromise. Can people assume it was already signed by the governor and ALQC?
If it was already signed and sealed, then PB acceptance after review will be merely ratification. If the deal was not considered perfected until it would pass the PB, then a board rejection might take it back to further negotiation and/or lawsuit.
PB'S FEAR AT THIS STAGE though is that the governor's public support to the compromise might influence public debate, if not the court litigation, on the issue.
Her explanation of the tax reduction supports and defends taxpayer ALQC.
GUV-PB RELATIONS. Surely, the ties are not like that between then governor Gwen Garcia and her party-mate board members.
There would've been no problem of the sort now afflicting PB-governor relations. Gwen was then master and captain of the ship; Pam, in the current setting, is not in full control. Her rival, though out of office, in a way controls or influences the PB as One Cebu matriarch.
Capitol reporters couldn't imagine Gwen berating Glenn in public, daring him, You want war?
JOINT HEARING OF TWO COMMITTEES has started. It will be a chance for the One Cebu force in the PB to show they can do the job of fiscalizing well, using solid law, facts and logic.
Some Capitol watchers may think the PB members under One Cebu haven't been doing real checks and balances for so long already they already forgot how that is done.
The PB needs to look at the problem the way loan collectors do: be tough on collecting the full amount plus interest and lost income and yet be shrewd enough to settle for only what the law says, which supports litigation victory, and capacity of the debtor to pay.
And while they're at it, they may also want to see if their suspicion of bribery or kickback has any real basis.
GUV PAM'S NAME IS ON THE LINE, which must explain the display of a woman's fury -- a commentator unsuitably used the unsafe word "menopausal" -- in Wednesday's press-con, which she capped by a gruff "thank you."
Core issue is whether the amount of the compromise was hugely reduced -- in favor of ALQC and against the interest of the Province -- because some Capitol representatives in the negotiation were misled in their thinking or influenced by fear or favor.
Lawyers and accounts must have been tapped for the technical skill required to come up with a compromise that follows the law and carries the correct numbers.
Yet it is Governor Baricuatro who must get the blame, or the credit, whatever the PB findings would be.
WON'T THE PB BE OUTCLASSED? To do the PB's job well, the board members of course would require expertise and skill equivalent or superior to that of the lawyers and accounts who packaged the questioned deal.
I have seen councilors and other local legislators perform at public hearings. At times, they're overwhelmed, confused or bedazzled by the volume and complexity of information they attempt to analyze and test for their real worth.