Tomas bets P40K Team Rama will abandon Mike

Osmeña

But Garganera says mayor only wants to know who he’ll go up against

THE verbal tussle over who gets to be Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña’s opponent in next year’s elections rose a notch yesterday.

The mayor offered a P40,000 bet that Team Rama won’t pick former Mayor Michael Rama as its standard bearer.

“If they will not accept Rama as mayor, I win P10,000. If they will, I’ll pay 40,000 and Rama is candidate for mayor. My insider tells me they won’t to pick him,” the mayor said.

Councilor Joel Garganera dismissed the mayor’s challenge, saying that the mayor only wanted to know who he’ll go up against in next year’s elections.

“He wanted to get a candidate out so that he will only deal with fewer candidates. No, mayor, you deal with it. Then as I’ve said before, our group right now is in the process of looking for the best candidate,” Garganera said.

Rama said in an interview with another daily that the mayor was “hallucinating” when he claimed that there was a heated exchange among Team

Rama members inside Garganera’s office last Tuesday afternoon.

“That’s why I’m willing to make a bet that Rama will not be their candidate for mayor. Maybe they will give him the vice mayor, something like that, but not their candidate for mayor,” Osmeña said.

Osmeña said a video of Garganera talking in their press conference was shown to him and he noticed that Rama looked furious.

“Maybe my hallucinations are true,” the mayor said.

Whoever his opponent is, Osmeña said his real opponent is the businesses that will support that candidate.

But Garganera said Osmeña is intrigued with their meeting because he doesn’t have any clue who his opponent is.

“You know what, the reason why the mayor is so intrigued with our meeting the other night is because as of now, right now, he doesn’t know who his opponent is and that is the beauty of it,” Garganera said in Cebuano.

Garganera said unlike Bando Osmeña-Pundok Kauswagan (BO-PK) in which Osmeña alone decides who will run at what post, Team Rama decides on a consensus among its members. Still, Garganera believed that the mayor’s challenge was a “trap” and he isn’t falling for it.

“And P40,000, that’s so little. I mean, I don’t have much money but that bet serves as his [Osmeña] solution to set aside his confusion,” said Garganera in Cebuano.