Tomas vows to recover SRP lots

 CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña vowed to recover the 45.2 hectares of lots at the South Road Properties that were bought by giant developers during the previous administration.

“I will win and I will get it back for you,” was among the highlights of Osmeña’s speech during the 80th Charter Anniversary of Cebu City yesterday morning.

The mayor said he considers the move as a “major challenge” as he is fighting three giant developers in the country – SM Prime Holdings, Inc., Ayala Corp., and Filinvest Land Inc.

“I’m not going to tell you that I’m going to do my best. I’m telling you simply, I will win, and I will get it back from you,” he told over a hundred of spectators at the Plaza Sugbo outside the City Hall.

Osmeña said that once he gets the lots back and sell them, he can use the money to increase the scholarship of city scholars, among others. At present, each scholar is given P10,000 and up to P50,000 per semester.

He asked that the people help him in the fight.

“Like I said, I’m not going to do my best. I will win. I’m going to fight this out. I will see to it I will win until they die,” he added.

Osmeña also said he is not minding the challenge of Michael Lloyd Dino, presidential assistant for the Visayas, for him to sell the lots within a month and, in return, Dino will resign from his post.

“To me, Dino is just another cockroach. You just have to learn how to deal with it. But he should not dictate what I’m going to do with the city. I have convictions, I have my plans,” Osmeña told reporters in an interview.

Former mayor Michael Rama who went to City Hall to offer flowers to the brass of Don Vicente Rama, the father of the Cebu City Charter, said cancelling the sale of the SRP lots is a tedious process and he hopes that the City Council will stand by the sale.

Rama said Osmeña is “bullying, intimidating, and coercing” the developers of SRP, adding, that Osmeña accomplished in convincing FLI to revoke the sale.

“Economic sabotage bringing investors to be afraid. We are not a city to be reigned by fear, to be intimidated. We are the city of respected people. This man (Don Vicente Rama) did not fight to make a city under fear… we should stand for what we believe because we (Team Rama) always believes that contract was valid, clear, and can stand anywhere, judicially,” Rama said.

He said all papers and documents involving the sale, which took place during his administration, are all “valid.”

Rama said all developers have their lawyers who conducted “due diligence.”

Meanwhile, still in his Charter Day speech, Osmeña admitted that his administration is “overwhelmed” by problems in the city. (FREEMAN)