The chances of the Cebu City Council scheduling another session for Supplemental Budget 1 (SB1) either today or any other day this week — the last of the year — are, to put it bluntly, about as nil as Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutierrez regaining the Miss Universe title or LA Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant reconsidering his retirement and returning for another full season in hopes of another (futile) title run.
It just isn’t happening as Councilor Margot Osmeña, chairperson of the powerful budget committee and wife of Bando Osmeña-Pundok Kauswagan (BO-PK) founder Tomas Osmeña, pointed out in interviews because most of them are on holiday break.
The councilor herself will visit relatives in Manila while acting Vice Mayor Nestor Archival, a BO-PK man, will toe the party line and shelve the SB1 further down the back burner, thus missing the chance to make a payment that would have cut the interest on the South Road Properties (SRP) loan substantially.
Last we heard of Archival, the acting vice mayor said he issued notices to the councilors for a special session at 2 p.m. today (Monday). But as the Cebu Daily News article noted, the issuance of notices was more of a courtesy to acting Vice Mayor Edgardo Labella, who knows he’s fighting a losing battle — at least perhaps this month — to have the SB1 approved before the year ends.
Not even his offer to sign on paper is a guarantee that he will assume responsibility for the city using the billions of pesos paid as down payment for SRP lots by Filinvest and a joint consortium of SM and Ayala if former prosecutor Romulo Torres wins his case to keep Cebu City Hall away from those funds.
Labella’s confidence stemmed from the court rejection of Torres’s case which doesn’t stop the former prosecutor from dragging it all the way to the Supreme Court.
To be sure, there is some precedent for the council’s reluctance after the Supreme Court ordered the city government to pay the Rallos heirs millions of pesos for the use of their family property in Sambag II.
To the mayor’s credit, however, he managed to turn the case around and present evidence of a convenio or agreement that would back the city’s contention that the lot in question was donated to the city and convince the courts to lift the freeze order on the city government’s bank accounts.
Whether the council passes SB1 or not, though, one thing is definite: both sides will try to arrive at a common solution to fund payment for the SRP loan’s due date in February.
Whether the loan be paid in part by either the SRP loan down payment or from the city’s internal resources, only city officials can answer. But they know they cannot afford not to make a decision on the case before February.
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