City Council summons Postal Bank for freezing City Hall checks

THE Cebu City Council will hold a special session today to find out why city deposits with the Philippine Postal Bank have been tagged or temporarily withheld.

“Some checks of the city were reportedly returned. That’s alarming. That’s very disturbing,” said Councilor Margot Osmeña during last Wednesday’s session.

She said they invited City Treasurer Ofelia Oliva, City Administrator Jose Marie Poblete and Postal Bank senior manager Ricardo Cordova to appear today.

The bank was trying to comply with a court notice to garnish the city’s accounts for the P133 million claim of the Rallos family for compensation of a lot expropriated in 1963.

An upset Mayor Michael Rama said he may take legal action against the bank or have all the city’s remaining deposits withdrawn if the Postal Bank doesn’t reverse itself.

“Why should they embarrass the City of Cebu this way? They should be careful about handling public funds,” said the mayor.

Councilor Osmeña, head of the budget committee, said she wants to know what city funds were deposited in Postal Bank and “the course of action of the city and how this will affect the city’s liquidity.”

Poblete said the returned checks were not considered bouncing checks and that the bank may lift its tagging anytime soon after being sent a copy of the Court of Appeals decision which granted the city’s petition for the nullification of the RTC decision and the issuance of a writ of execution on the Rallos case.

Meanwhile, the Rallos family won’t easily give up.

They asked the Court of Appeals (CA) to set aside a ruling that stopped the lower court and its sheriffs from collecting funds from the Cebu City government or auctioning off city-owned properties to pay off their P133 million claim.

Their lawyer Fortunato Veloso said the CA resolutino was null and void or isued “without or in excess jurisdiction and/or issued with grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of its jurisdiction.”

They asked the appellate court to quash or recall the writ of preliminary injunction against the Regional Trial Court and the heirs of Rev. Fr. Vicente Rallos , among others.

Associate Justice Gabriel Ingles of the CA’s 18th division earlier found sufficient basis to stop the RTC (Regional Trial Court) and the sheriff from asking Cebu City to pay the Ralloses.

Ingles said the dispute involved public funds and the writ was urgently needed to prevent “serious damage” to the city.

In resolving the matter, Justice Ingles said he took into consideration the “convenio” presented by the city government.

A document of the old compromise agreement was discovered last year by city officials, through former Cebu City councilor Jocelyn Pesquera, showing a prior agreement between feuding descendants of the Rallos family in the 1940s.

The convenio was a decision of the Court of First Instance of the Province of Cebu dated Oct. 18, 1940.

The agreement would purportedly prove that the Cebu city government need not pay for a lot that was supposed to be donated by the Ralloses to the local government unit.

City lawyers only mentioned the convenio during a hearing last year.

Although the convenio was presented, the lower court still didn’t reverse its ruling which ordered the city to pay at least P133 million to the Rallos .

RTC Judge James Himalaloan said the agreement wasn’t considered a “supervening event that transpired after judgment of the case which became final and executory.”

The Ralloses questioned the authenticity of the convenio since it was purportedly unsigned./Reporter Ador Vincent S. Mayol with a report from Chief of Reporters Doris C. Bongcac