Cebu City owes Consolacion private landfill owner, haulers

A private landfill in Consolacion was used by the Ceby City government as dumping site for its garbage, a practice which was stopped by Mayor Tomas Osmeña for being too costly. (CDN FILE PHOTO)

Cebu City Hall still owes the owner of the private landfill in Consolacion as well as private haulers for services rendered earlier this year.

According to Cebu City Councilor Margarita Osmeña, who had a brief stint as acting mayor last June, it’s difficult to “legally” pay Asian Energy Systems Corp., which owns the Consolacion landfill, since the city has no contract with them.

The same goes for the private haulers which were hired earlier by the administration of former mayor Michael Rama.

“I can’t say it’s (paying the landfill and haulers) completely out of the picture. But there should be a way to pay them legally. You know, the one who will authorize the payment for them now will be the one in trouble for a sin done before,” she said.

The city owes Asian Energy Systems Corp. P32 million for tipping fees for garbage dumped by the city from January to June this year. The private landfill, located in Barangay Pologan, Consolacion, charges the city P700 per ton as tipping fee.

Aside from this, Osmeña said a private hauler had been asking her, since earlier this year, for payment of P29 million for services they rendered to the city for two months.

She said the private hauler charges the city P1,500 per ton of garbage. Under this scheme, the hauler uses his own trucks and transports the garbage from transfer station in Inayawan all the way to the landfill in Consolacion. The rate already includes the P700 tipping fee.

When she was acting mayor, Margot said the Commission on Audit (COA) called the attention of the city because of the absence of a contract with the Consolacion landfill, which was also chosen through “direct contracting” by the former administration.

Back then, she said, the city, through the efforts of former city councilor Nida Cabrera, tried to draft a contract with the landfill owner. But apparently, the contract hadn’t been made.

She also questioned why the city pays more than other local government units even if Cebu City is the landfill’s biggest customer. She said other dumpers are only charged P400 per ton.

Cebu City Vice Mayor Edgardo Labella earlier said he was willing to negotiate a cheaper deal with the Consolacion landfill and possibly come up with a formal contract with them.

There have been numerous complaints about the continued use of the Inayawan landfill because of the stench which emanates from the facility.