BACOLOD City – Councilor Claudio Jesus Puentevella was against authorizing Mayor Evelio Leonardia to apply for a P1.7-billion loan with the Municipal Development Fund Office of the Department of Finance.
Puentevella said they should have been given more time to scrutinize the executive’s plan to enter into a loan agreement.
Leonardia wrote the city councilors requesting for the authority on July 9. The Sangguniang Panlungsod approved the resolution granting the request during its regular session on July 11.
Councilor Caesar Distrito, author of the resolution granting Leonardia the authority, said the amount will be used to finance several projects, including:
* Progreso Village Relocation Site development, P350 million
* Bacolod City College site development and facilities, P350 million
* Bacolod MassKara Coliseum, P800 million
* construction of roads and bridges, P200 million
Puentevella was the lone dissenting vote. He lamented that the city council seemed to be “always on a rush to approve millions or billions (of pesos) worth of projects.”
Voting in favor of the resolution were Distrito, Cindy Rojas, Renecito Novero, Em Ang, Dindo Ramos, Elmer Sy, Bartolome Orola, Ayesha Joy Villaflor, Noli Villarosa, and Ana Marie Palermo. Wilson Gamboa Jr. abstained.
Ricardo Tan, the acting vice mayor, and Councilor Sonya Verdeflor, who presided the session, were unable to vote.
The loan from the Finance department will have a “very minimal” interest of 3 percent, Distrito said.
Puentevella said Leonardia’s request for authority to apply for a loan was not included in their agenda at the time and was brought up minutes before they adjourned.
He claimed that they received the copies of the letter of intent and application for loan “five minutes before the session.”
“We were deprived [of time] to peruse and study the … documents,” he stressed.
Puentevella believed giving them a week to look into the matter would not cause any delay. “The mayor himself did not indicate in his letter the urgency of the request,” he said.
He stressed the city must settle first its existing loans for the construction of the Bacolod City Government Center in 2007 and the acquisition of the sanitary landfill and the Arao property in 2009 before entering into another loan agreement.
“Why these four projects when, in reality, our constituents need public hospitals?” Puentevella said of the projects the new loan would finance.
“I support the Build, Build, Build program but not the Loan, Loan, Loan activity of the city,” he added./PN
