Busay Barangay Captain Emilio Lopez (center) and barangay councilman Yody Sanchez with Cebu City Councilor Dave Tumulak (left, clad in white shirt) watch as members of rival fraternities Alpha Kappa Rho and Tau Gamma Phi paint over their respective logos after a meeting at the barangay hall. CDN Photo/Junjie Mendoza
To avoid escalating frat wars in Cebu City, the Tau Gamma fraternity volunteered to remove their logos from the city’s walls starting yesterday.
Cebu City Councilor Dave Tumulak said Tau Gamma’s voluntary action can help promote cleanliness and discourage vandalism in the city’s streets aside from easing tension with rival fraternities.
Tumulak, also concurrent deputy mayor for police matters, said they tapped sponsors to repaint the walls that were cleaned up by Tau Gamma.
He said the city government is also calling on other fraternities to cooperate with them.
“If they remove their logos, no one from the rival fraternities will remove and vandalize them and this would prevent clashes among them. Those logos will only entice those who have criminal records or a history of criminal activities,” Tumulak said in Cebuano.
He said social media posts on the recent shooting incident in Barangays Busay and Punta Princesa have sparked speculations of frat wars.
“For the record last week’s shooting of the Ong brothers (Nick Benzen and Neil Brian) inside a bar is not fraternity violence despite reports that the Ong brothers are members of the Akro fraternity,” Tumulak said.
“That incident was also followed by a shooting incident involving a Tau Gamma member giving rise to suspicions that it was a frat war. But to clarify, these shootings are unrelated,” the councilor said.
Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña said the city will support these organizations.
“We will help them. We will implement a program demonstrating how to clean a vandalized wall and we’ll be working with Island Paint,” the mayor said in yesterday’s press conference. The pilot area for the project would cover Barangays Bulacao to Mambaling, he said.
Both the police and Tumulak were scheduled to accompany Tau Gamma in yesterday’s activity.
Osmeña said they are only waiting on other fraternities like Alpa Kappa Rho to join the program.