BETTER SAFE THAN SICK People inside a gymnasium in Minglanilla town in Cebu wear face masks although the province has made it optional. —MARY GRACE OBERES
CEBU CITY—Cebu Vice Gov. Hilario Davide III has advised those who question the local ordinance that allows the optional use of face masks in open and well-ventilated spaces in the province to bring their concerns to the trial court.
In an interview, Davide said the ordinance, which echoed Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia’s Executive Order No. 16, did not violate any law, contrary to claims from the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) that it is invalid and illegal.
“My position on that is since it’s already an ordinance, so it’s now a law. I think that will prevail,” said Davide, a lawyer and the presiding officer when the Provincial Board passed an ordinance on the use of face masks during a special session on June 14.
Davide suggested to the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF), which includes the DILG, to question both Garcia’s EO and the ordinance’s legality in court.
“If the IATF would like to question that, then they should go to the court to question the validity of the ordinance,” he said.
No legal basis
Interior Secretary Eduardo Año repeatedly said the ordinance had no legal basis and was considered defective because it contradicts the national policies embodied in the IATF guidelines, which ordered as mandatory the use of face masks in public places.
But Davide said the passage of the ordinance was backed by provisions of the Local Government Code that grants provincial governments local autonomy in creating laws.
Even if they belong to opposing political camps, Davide said he and Garcia agreed with the local policy on the use of face masks in the province.
Meanwhile, Garcia has defended the former director of the Cebu Provincial Police Office (CPPO) who was relieved from his post after supporting the optional use of face masks in the province.
In a press conference on Wednesday, Garcia called out Lt. Gen. Vicente Danao Jr., officer in charge of the Philippine National Police, for “public shaming” Col. Engelbert Soriano.
Garcia said she would not have wanted to comment on the relief of Soriano as she understood the processes in the tenure of officers in the PNP.
But what caught her ire was the public shaming and unceremonious removal from post of Soriano, who was charged of politicking.
Optional use
Soriano was relieved from his post as CPPO director on June 12 or a day after he issued a statement that he supported the executive order of Garcia on the optional use of face masks in Cebu province.
But according to Col. Jean Fajardo, spokesperson for the PNP, the relief of Soriano from his post was “for career advancement.”
She cited PNP Memorandum Circular No. 2022-002, which states that provincial and city directors will be held by a police colonel for a continuous period of one year, extendible to a maximum of three months.
Garcia said Soriano, who was named director of the CPPO in April 2021, did not commit any infraction in supporting her order.
“I was trying to ask again and again what violent crime, what violent infraction or violation did Colonel Soriano commit, except that he took a stand recognizing my executive order,” the governor said.
The governor threw a question at Danao who accused Soriano of politicking.
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