Bid to dispose three ha. SRP lot through public bidding pushed

The Cebu City Government is determined to dispose a three-hectare parcel of land in the South Road Properties (SRP) before the year ends.

Francisco Fernandez, executive assistant of Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña, said in a press briefing on Monday that they were planning to conduct a public bidding on SRP Lot 1-F-8.

Disposing SRP Lot 1-F-8 was supposed to go through Swiss challenge, but, Fernandez said, they had yet to receive any feedback from the Commission on Audit (COA).

“I-public bidding nalang nato kay sa public bidding, dili ta kinahanglan og prior approval gikan sa COA (We will just do a public bidding because in a public bidding, we don’t need the prior approval from COA),” said Fernandez.

“Swiss challenge unta to. Nag submit na ta og letter sa COA unya dugay man kaayo. Until now, wala gihapon. So, i-public bidding na nato (It was supposed to go through a Swiss challenge. We submitted a letter to COA, but it will take long. Until now, there’s no response from them. So, we will do a public bidding),” he added.

Fernandez also said they would be aiming to conduct the public bidding before 2018 would end.

“Well, dapat lang (it should be). Otherwise, it’s dereliction of duty ug dili na mapublish nato (if we are not able to publish it) before the end of the year,” Fernandez said.

Last March, it was revealed that GT Capital Holdings, through Federal Land Inc., is planning to purchase SRP Lot 1-F-8 to develop it into a luxury, residential and commercial center.

They proposed to buy the parcel of land, which is located near the office of the Department of Public Works and Highways in Central Visayas (DPWH-7), at P115,000 per square meters.

GT Capital Holdings owns and operates Metrobank, AXA Philippines, and Metro Pacific Investments Corp.

Now that they are processing the documents needed to conduct a public bidding, Fernandez said the city government is also hoping to entertain more interested buyers for SRP Lot-1-F-8.

“We hope there are more companies interested because if we’re going to do public bidding, we need at least three bidders,” said Fernandez.

“That’s also the reason nganong mag public bidding na lang ta because I think sa atong assessment daghan interesado ana, dili lang ang Federal Land (That’s also the reason why we’re going to do a public bidding because I think in our assessment, Many are interested on buying the lot, Not only Federal Land),” he added.

But in the meantime, Fernandez said, they were waiting for any word from the City Hall’s appraisal committee to determine the present value of SRP Lot 1-F-8 before proceeding full-steam with the public bidding.

“Og ang value sa appraisal committee less than the P110,000 nga gi-specify sa ordinance (And if the value from the appraisal committee is less than P110,000 specified by the ordinance) then we will go ahead and bid it out based on the ordinance,” he said.

In 2017, the City Council passed an ordinance authorizing Osmeña to sell SRP Lot 1-F-8 with a price tag of P110,000 per square meter. This meant that the city could reap an additional income amounting to P3.19-billion.