Lapu Mayor Chan tries to shoo away Rep. Radaza from her City Hall office

Lapu-Lapu City Representative Paz Radaza (left) has defied Mayor Junard Chan’s ultimatum to vacate the Representative’s Office at City Hall. | CDN Digital file photos

CEBU CITY, Philippines — On the first day of work as newly elected officials,  Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Junard “Ahong” Chan and the city’s lone district Representative Paz Radaza are at loggerheads on who should stay at the Lapu-Lapu District’s Representative’s Office at City Hall.

Chan, who wanted to make the representative’s office as the mayor’s office, gave Representative Radaza a 24-hour ultimatum to vacate the City Hall space.

The letter received by a member of Radaza’s office staff at 10:40 a.m., said that Chan would intend to hold office at the space now occupied by the district representative.

“Further, you are hereby directed to vacate the premises within 24 hours from receipt of this notice,” the letter read.

But Representative Radaza said on a July 1  statement, which was also posted on her Facebook page, that she would not heed Chan’s ultimatum.

She said she would not vacate the office, citing an ordinance of a Representative’s right to hold office at City Hall.

She said it was the due right of the district representative to have an office at the City Hall as provided by a city ordinance enacted  on June 6, 2019.

“The [city ordinance] has not been repealed nor judicially nullified, and thus, should be respected and complied with,” Radaza said.

“With all due respect, we thus cannot heed the Notice to Vacate,” she added.

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This July 1 incident happened a few days after then outgoing Mayor Radaza criticized Chan for his choice of department heads, whom Radaza claimed were not Oponganons.

Chan, for his part, told Radaza to give him a chance to run the city because he was the mayor now and they had different styles of running it.

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Meanwhile, aside from defying Chan’s July 1 ultimatum, Radaza also said that she had sought police help to investigate the alleged forced entry inside the district representative’s office.

In a separate post, Radaza also showed a photo of a glass door with its lock broken.

She claimed that a member of a staff of Chan admitted to one of the members of her staff that they were the ones responsible for the alleged forced entry.

“Niangkon ang mga [staff] ni Mayor Ahong Chan nga ilang gilungkab ang pultahan sa luyong bahin sa akong opisina aron makasulod sila kay wala kunoy yawi,” she said.

(A member of the staff of Mayor Ahong Chan admitted that they forcibly opened the backdoor of my office because they did not have the key to open it.)

Radaza said their legal counsel was now looking into possible legal measures that they might take following the incident./dbs