Cops file raps vs Cebu City mayor who riled Duterte

Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña. (CDN PHOTO/JUNJIE MENDOZA)

CEBU CITY—Police pressed charges against Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña for allegedly interfering with their work, hours before President Rodrigo Duterte ranted against the official who reportedly accused him of being a “protector” of illegal drugs and telling the national government not to meddle in the affairs of the city.

In a complaint filed Thursday at the Office of the Ombudsman in the Visayas, Sr. Supt. Royina Garma, Cebu City police chief, accused Osmeña of facilitating the release of three detainees arrested last week for illegally refilling butane canisters with liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).

Garma said Osmeña was liable for obstruction of justice, abuse of authority and violation of ethical standards for public officials.

Osmeña has been at odds with the police since last year after the National Police Commission removed his supervision over the city police office.

But what surprised many was Mr. Duterte’s verbal attack against Osmeña, who was known to be close to the President since he was still mayor of Davao City.

5-minute rant

As late as last week when he spoke at the League of Municipalities of the Philippines meeting in Cebu City, Mr. Duterte was even thanking Osmeña for his support in the fight against illegal drugs.

But in a speech on Thursday at the 49th Mandaue City Charter Day celebration, Mr. Duterte went into a five-minute rant against Osmeña for allegedly accusing him of being a protector of illegal drugs and saying the national government should not interfere with the affairs of the city.

“There is one official I wanted to talk to who has been spreading false stories,” Mr. Duterte said without first mentioning Osmeña by name.

Mr. Duterte said he had asked someone to arrange the meeting “so that when I see him I could slap him.”

“You know who he is. He is the braggart who has been in politics for a long time, who says something like, ‘Don’t interfere with Cebu because it is ours’,” Mr. Duterte said. “You son of a bitch! If you want to leave the Philippines, drag Cebu along with you in the Pacific.”

“Who are you to say that? As if you own Cebu. By what right? Just because you were a former … President’s son or grandson?” the President also said.

Osmeña is the grandson of the late President Sergio Osmeña Sr.

‘So be it’

“Hey! Tomas! This isn’t the Spanish times anymore, OK? Your style and the way you speak is as if you’re so high and mighty. And you even said that I am supposedly a protector of ‘shabu’ (crystal meth),” Mr. Duterte said.

Minutes after the President finished speaking at the Mandaue Cultural and Sports Complex, Osmeña responded, saying he was just pointing out a problem.

“The President is entitled to say whatever he wants. As a lawyer, I am sure that he knows there are two sides to any story, and not just what [Presidential Assistant for the Visayas Michael] Diño and PRO-7 (Police Regional Office 7) are telling him,” the mayor said in a post on his Facebook page.

He explained that he was just pointing out the problem of illegal drugs and criminality in Cebu, which he said the police had refused to admit, insisting instead that Cebu was still safe.

“If I have to be the bad guy for mentioning that there is a problem, so be it,” he said, adding that he would continue doing his job.

“I was elected by the Cebuanos, and it is them I am obligated to. I will continue to act in the interest of my people, especially those who have no one else to stand up for them,” he added.

The complaint filed against Osmeña by the Cebu City police was accompanied by video footage taken by security cameras at the Parian Police Station and affidavits of five policemen when he went to the precinct on Aug. 24 to take custody of three detainees—Ramir Amaca, Romeo Appareca and Romeo Cueva.

The three were arrested for allegedly refilling butane canisters with LPG, a violation of Presidential Decree No. 1865, at T. Padilla Public Market.

Bending law ‘a little bit’

Osmeña, Garma said, violated “a very basic rule—not to intervene in any arrest.”

“The bottom line here is respect,” Garma said.

In a previous interview about the incident, Osmeña said he “bends the law a little bit for poor people because of mercy.”

He said he just wanted to help people who were trying to make a living by hawking.

“They were caught on a Friday and they’re going to be in jail the whole weekend,” he said. —WITH A REPORT FROM JOSE SANTINO S. BUNACHITA