City prioritizes SRP loan payment over seniors aid

Another P220 million was taken from Cebu City Hall’s coffers to pay off the balance of this year’s amortization for the city’s South Road Properties (SRP) loan last Monday.

City Treasurer Tessie Camarillo said they had to “prioritize” the more urgent expenses like payment of the SRP loan to make sure that the city will not be charged with penalties for any delayed payments.

Other obligations like the release of the P6,000 balance of the senior citizens assistance will have to wait until more funds are made available, she said.

The City Treasurers Office has so far collected P2.2 billion or 34 percent of its P6.4 billion collection target as of June 30.

“Naningkamot mi nga maka kolekta gyud ta aron ma fund ang atong (annual) budget (We are working hard to collect so we can fund the annual budget),” she told Cebu Daily News.

She said the ongoing tax mapping operations are expected to increase the city’s real property and business tax revenues due to updating of real property usage.

Camarillo said yesterday’s SRP loan repayments cannot be avoided because it will be automatically deducted from the city’s deposits with the Land Bank of the Philippines.

The Cebu City government made its first payment of P200 million for its SRP loan in February.

Its second and final payment for the year was due yesterday. But payments were made on Monday yet.

Camarillo said the city’s loan amortization varies because it is computed based on the present exchange rate of the peso and the yen.

The city government availed of the SRP loan from the Japanese government. Repayments are made through LBP.

Camarillo clarified that the SRP loan payment is not the reason for the delays in the financial assistance to senior citizens and the barangay officials.

Barangay captains are supposed to get P5,000 assistance from the city per month while P3,000 each will go to the barangay councilors, Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) chairman and secretary.