City councilors allied with the Bando Osmeña-Pundok Kauswagan (BOPK) left their leader, former mayor Tomas Osmeña, in the dark when they signed a draft resolution authorizing Mayor Michael Rama to sell portions of the South Road Properties (SRP) through public bidding.
Osmeña, who has been opposing the sale plan, said no one told him about the proposed resolution which is scheduled for discussion in today’s City Council session.
“I do not know what to think of it. I’m in the dark,” Osmeña said.
But one things is now clear to him, “the city is now bankrupt that is why they wanted to sell” the SRP.
“There is no more money. There is a problem on cash flow,” he said.
BO-PK-allied Councilors Gerardo Carillo, Richard Osmeña, Nestor Archival Sr., Roberto Cabarrubias, Noel Wenceslao and Eugenio Gabuya co-authored the draft resolution with administration-backed Councilors Mary Ann delos Santos, Nendell Abella, David Tumulak, James Cuenco and Philip Zafra.
Up for disposal at a floor price of P20,000 per square meters are Lot No. 8 where the San Pedro Calungsod templete is located and Lot Nos. 7 and 17. Lot No. 8 has a total land area of 26 hectares while Lot Nos. 7 and 17 has 19.2 hectares.
The resolution’s authors said the new SRP lot disposal has to be made to fund the city’s obligations to senior citizens, scholars and its medical assistance program.
Having extra cash would also allow City Hall to pay off the balance of about P3 billion of its loan with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
The loan was used to bankroll the construction of the 300-hectare South Reclamation Project.
Carillo said that selling land is an alternative to the executive department’s earlier plan to apply for a low interest loan to buy out the city’s existing loan with the Land Bank of the Philippines that is acting as JICA’s conduit.
Depleted fund
City Hall earlier sold SRP lots to SM Primeholdings, Inc. and Filinvest Land , Inc. and leased a portion to Bigfoot Studios Inc. The city government earned P5.8 billion from the three transactions.
However, the city’s revenues from the three lot sales is now “depleting.” Of the P5.8 billion proceeds, the city is only set to collect the remaining receivables of P588 million until 2016.
“The depletion of revenue generated from previous SRP transactions would mean that the continuance of the aforementioned programs may be compromised; therefore, securing other sources of income is both necessary and urgent if the servicing of these programs is to be maintained,” said the draft resolution.
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