DESPITE the death of her husband in 2007, Rohama Luage was a jolly person.
Her co-workers at the Cebu City Division for the Welfare of the Urban Poor (DWUP) could not believe Luage’s life would end the way it did.
Luage’s body was found at the foot of a cliff in Barangay Cansumoroy, Balamban. She was shot and dumped there allegedly by her lover, Mabini Barangay Captain Rey Oybenes.
Oybenes shot himself later inside a City Government-owned pickup truck parked along the road in Tigbao, Cebu City.
DWUP Chief Collin Rosell said Luage was the “life of their office” since she started working at DWUP two years ago.
Laughter
“Hingatawa na siya. Wa jud mi ga expect nga mamatay siya og ing-ato (She was often laughing. We did not expect her to die that way),” he said.
He said Luage, 32, was a jolly person who did not have problems.
He said Luage was a socio-economic surveyor of the City's socialized housing beneficiaries.
Her tasks included processing the documents for beneficiaries of the City Government's burial assistance and the Let There Be Light program.
Rosell said the last time he saw Luage at DWUP was on Tuesday. He said Oybenes visited Luage around 10 a.m. that day.
Another DWUP employee, who requested not to be named, agreed with Rosell. “We were always laughing in the office,” she said.
She said Luage confided to her once that her fights with Oybenes would often get violent.
Condo
Rosell said Luage lived with her children in a unit at the Cebu City Condominium on N. Bacalso Ave.
The City Government allowed Luage to live there when her husband, PO1 Noriel Luage, died in the line of duty in 2007.
Rosell said he learned that Luage was building a house in one of the socialized housing sites of the City in Barangay Bulacao.
“Wa pa man na nahuman. Ambot kung mahuman ba na ron nga wa na man siya. Temporary ra man gud na sila diha sa condominium (The house is not yet finished and I don’t know if it will ever be now that she is dead. Their stay at the condominium is just temporary),” he said.
Yesterday, DWUP employees placed messages, candles and flowers on Luage's desk. One message said, “I love you, goodbye.”
Philip Zafra, chief of staff of Mayor Michael Rama, said the City will be extending financial assistance to the families of Luage and Oybenes. But he could not say how much.
Under the City's burial assistance program, the family of the deceased gets P10,000.
The Association of Barangay Councils-Cebu City will also give P30,000 cash aid to the family of Oybenes.