Change of management

The defunding of the Cebu Investment Promotions Center (CIPC), while lamentable, was to be expected for two things: the city ordinance that mandates it to be the sole marketing arm and authorized seller of the South Road Properties (SRP) and by extension, the City Council as the arbiter and reviewer of whom to sell the city’s prime real estate to.

By itself, the ordinance sounds sensible but when mired in local politics, the picture gets complicated. Chafing under restrictions set on him by the council, majority of whom he had severed political ties with, Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama opted to exercise his options and withhold financing for the CIPC.

With the funding all but gone and Rama’s reelection last May, most of the CIPC board of trustees, all respected business leaders in the city, decided to quit on June 30.

In last Monday’s 135th birth anniversary of his grandfather, Sergio Osmena Sr., former congressman Tomas Osmeña blamed Rama for the CIPC’s limbo but stopped short of predicting doom for the SRP which he and the CIPC shepherded for years before it bore fruit with the entry of SM and Filinvest.

Except for Japanese investors who are considering to set up a retirement facility in the SRP, Osmeña said Rama has brought in zero investors to the site.

While Osmeña has a point, it remains to be seen how the mayor can and will sell the SRP not only to domestic but foreign investors.

As it is, the mayor appears only too eager to immediately sell SRP lots if only to get out of the liquidity problems that hold back his ambitious, multi-million peso projects for the city.

With no CIPC, the city government would have to practicaly rely on Mayor Rama as its salesman and deal closer.

The council, controlled by the Bando Osmeña- Pundok Kauswagan, finds that prospect untenable.

We hope the council aimed for transparency and accountability when it enacted that ordinance and not just to spite Rama with whom they are politically at odds.

Would the public be assured of the same transparency and implementation of that ordinance if Osmeña was elected instead or would he simply dictate the SRP development on his terms anew?

At the same time, can Rama assure his constituents about transparency and accountability in his dealings with investors as well as in marketing the SRP to the world?

Whoever Rama appoints as his marketing team for the SRP should be held accountable not only by him but by his constituents lest we see the spectacle of a “fire sale” of SRP lots that may provide immediate returns but could also compromise the city’s economic future and become a milking cow for an unscrupulous few.