Monday, July 13, 2009 [ sunstar.com.ph ]
By Gerome M. Dalipe
CAPITOL officials shrug-ged off yesterday the latest tirade of Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña against the Provincial Government, particularly his suggestion to convert the Cebu International Convention Center (CICC) into a provincial hospital since it is a white elephant.
The governor’s brother, Rep. Pablo John Garcia (Cebu Province, 3rd district), said he sees no reason at all to heed Osmeña’s suggestion.
“But I can see why the SRP (South Road Properties) should be converted into an impounding area for the City’s favored towing company,” Garcia said in a text message.
“Failures cannot stand success. The Province is in a very strong financial position. (It has) increased income… (with) no debts. In the city, the only ones making an income are its creditor banks and the towing company,” Garcia said.
Even as Congressman Garcia was defending his sister Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia, another Osmeña also spoke up against the Capitol administration.
Former senator John Henry “Sonny” Osmeña broke his silence and “reminded” the governor that the Province’s assets of P20 billion should be given back to the people as basic services and infrastructure projects.
“Money acquired by the government should be spent, not dangled as bait to ensure obedience among the political underlings, nor waved about as a trophy in a one-upmanship contest with neighboring provinces,” Sonny said in a press statement.
“(Governor) Garcia gets it all wrong. Government exists to serve the people, not to function as a profit-motivated bank. The P20 billion in total assets Governor Garcia announced in her State of the Province Address is P20 billion worth of services denied to two and a half million people in over a thousand barangays,” he said.
In her speech last Friday, Governor Garcia said the CICC continues to provide Cebu with “a world-class venue for conventions and exhibitions” and gave the Province close to P47 million in income since it was officially opened in 2007.
“Not bad for a building that someone, quite curiously, claims to have been built out of scrap metal,” the governor said, recalling an accusation that both Tomas and Sonny separately made.
Hospital
The CICC, the governor has said, also generated “multiplier effect value” of about P295 million in 2008 and P476 million from January to June 2009, citing estimates from the meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions (MICE) industry.
Mayor Osmeña is currently in the US for a medical checkup, but he sent City Hall reporters text messages over the weekend criticizing the governor’s speech, particularly on the revenues generated by the CICC.
Capitol spokesperson lawyer Rory Jon Sepulveda simply laughed at Mayor Osmeña’s idea for the CICC.
“We can understand his liking for a hospital. But rest assured the Province has a functioning plan for hospitals,” said Sepulveda.
“If he (Mayor Osmeña) is not blinded by his envy and false pride, he can easily see that instead of competing, CICC is complementing the hospitality sector’s MICE market,” he added.
Cebu Provincial Board Member (PB) Peter John Calderon found the mayor’s suggestion “purely ridiculous.”
The PB committee on public health and social welfare chairperson said there is no reason to turn the CICC into a provincial hospital, when the building is giving the Province huge revenues.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on July 13, 2009.
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