Charter Day ahead

There’s another controversy in the  Cebu city government, this time about individuals to be awarded on the Charter Day celebration on  Feb. 24.

The City Council through the Cultural and Historical Affairs Commission (CHAC)  recommended more than a dozen individuals and organizations, including  former city treasurer Tessie Camarillo and the Asian College of Technology (ACT).

Mayor  Mike Rama opposed these two particular choices saying that  Camarillo is not qualified  because she is an insider and he lost his trust in her especially during the budget deliberations.

In the case of ACT, which is owned by City Councilor Bebot Abellanosa, the mayor said it would be improper to award one of their own legislators.

Councilor Joey Daluz supported his objection though  some commentators see political color in that move. I heard Councilor Margot Osmena in an interview say  the city council through the CHAC only recommended persons and entities for the award but that it is the mayor who has the final sayso if he rejects a nominee, they  have to accept it.

The City Council  should have been very careful in recommending nominees. Recommending  Tessie Camarillo was just like challenging the mayor to praise someone he had lost trust in. What the  council did was more of a ploy to embarrass  Rama.

But why is City Charter so important to  Mayor  Rama? Because the no. 1  author of the law that made Cebu a City was our grandfather Sen.  Vicente Rama.

Other places were made cities ahead of Cebu. It  was Lolo Inting who singlehandedly fought to make Cebu a city. Ironically many Cebuano politicians and civic organizations in Cebu during that time opposed the bill of Rama that converted the Municipality of Cebu to Cebu City

Today  we enjoy the fruits of  cityhood, the result of  Vicente Rama’s labors, when  Commonwealth Act No. 58 was enacted in 1936.

Lolo Inting was always working although he was suffering from illnesses like diabetes. When he was a congressman, he authored a bill that required students to read Jose Rizal’s “Noli Me Tangere” and “El Filibusterismo,” but this was not passed in Congress then because of the influence of the Spaniards.

Vicente Rama, the  public servant, had the interests of the people first in his agenda, just like his grandson Mayor Mike Rama, and was  deliberate and calculating in his decisions.

From reading  my grandfather’s diaries, I discovered  he was a very loving and  doting father to his 13 children, to whom he would write letters .  He was a fair man who once sent a  compadre to prison for attempting to bribe him into granting a favor. But Lolo was convinced by his wife Catalina Genson to show compassion and had his compadre released from prison.

My grandfather would gather all his daughters, including my late mother Reynalda, and ask each of them to finish college before plunging into marriage so that whatever happens to the union, they could  survivewithout the husband.

I’d like to believe that among his grandchildren,  I had the opportunity to read all his personal documents stuffed in the old Rama Compound house of our grandparents. I had a grand time going through these papers.

Don Vicente was meticulous. In his diary he  wrote the names of all  his children, their date of birth and the ninongs and ninangs during the baptism. At the  foot of the Philippine flag in Luneta Park, one can find his name.

As a grandson of Don Vicente Rama, just like Mayor Rama, I am very proud of the Father of the Cebu City Charter who was also the city’s first mayor.