As long as vendors continue to resist the modernization of the Carbon Market, clashes such as this one between the vendors and market personnel will continue.
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama has instructed the city’s police and market personnel to ensure the safety of children at the Carbon Market.
This order came after the Cebu City Council has endorsed to the Commission on Human Rights (CHR), Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), and the police a video that showed the alleged use of children as human shields during the clashes in the Carbon Market on March 11 and March 21, 2022.
“They (police, market personnel) know already, we already have a discussion of the vendors. The railings will be put in place but should not be near the stalls. It’s a noble intention really…I am the mayor, I do my job, I should maintain peace and order and the police they know their job,” said the mayor.
Yet the mayor does not want to focus on the incident on the children alone, or whether it was instigated by groups or individuals, as he wants the problem in the Carbon Market solved.
“I wish that did not happen. But we do not have to focus on that. We will solve the problem in the Carbon Market,” he added.
The mayor is aware that as long as the resistance of vendors continues against the Joint Venture Agreement (JVA) the city signed with Megawide Construction Corp, similar clashes could happen again, thereby endangering the lives of vulnerable individuals.
So the mayor said that he would focus on the bigger picture, continue dialogues with the vendors regarding the JVA especially the supplemental Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) he has proposed to the council, and eventually pass the MOA.
“We have to look at the bigger picture and the bigger picture is that the development should proceed,” he said. /rcg
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