The Iloilo City Housing Scam

Hole of Justice

by Peter G. Jimenea

The Iloilo City Housing Scam

We learned that the remaining unsold portion of the city government lot in Pavia, will soon be in-line for sale by our city officials. It is the site of a housing project that started in 2001 but was abandoned by the contractor thus, totally deteriorated in 2009.

Of the 413 houses to be built under the contract with the city government, not even a single unit was completely built by the contractor. Still, then Mayor Jerry Trenas failed to explain why this thing happened to the millions worth of project under his watch.

The waste in millions of taxpayers money without any good return is stepping over the line of pardonable behavior committed by a public official. Trenas surely know that the spending of government fund carries with it official accountability and responsibility under the law.

Yet, the mayor kept mum about this corruption in his administration. Deliberate or not, he failed to notice that his early stewardship of the city government as chief executive seems to have been distorted by indomitable corruption!

The Iloilo City Government Employees Low Cost Housing Project was bankrolled by a loan of P120 Million from the Phil. National Bank (PNB). The contract was awarded to Ace Builders, owned by Mr. Alex Trinidad, a friend of Mayor Trenas.

When the construction started, the P120M loan from the PNB was transferred to the Philippine Veterans Bank (PVB). On why, nobody knows. But this eventually bind the city to a new account of P132M due to expensive documentation.

The problem starts when the materials used in the construction of the supposed 413 houses in Pavia, Iloilo, were discovered of substandard quality. So the city council pass a unanimous resolution urging the mayor to rescind the contract with Ace Builders and sue the contractor.

But Mayor Trenas cannot be intimidated by a mere resolution. He ignored it and continued paying the contractor's billing in million of pesos. Despite the residual imperfection their will was done!

The failed project could already hold the mayor liable for violation of RA 3019, or the Anti Graft and Corrupt Practices Act. As a lawyer, he surely knew his official responsibility and accountability attendant thereto. Yet, it seems a stranger to him by feeling immune from consequences of his act.

Thus, the project that started in 2001 during his first term as mayor has ended a white elephant in 2009, months before his term expires. In street-smart parlance, the project is a "hao shiao." The mayor should know that it is only for him and the city hall crooks that what he did was good!

Few have the faintest idea that the city had been paying P17,000 daily interest for that loan including holidays for over a year. The total interest paid for this mess has reached P24.7M. This deliberate injustice to the taxpayers' money is a crime that cries to God for vengeance!

Only the intervention of the Ombudsman has stopped the mayor from paying the contractor. Unfortunately, Mr. Trinidad, had already pocketed P62.5M.of the city government fund before the the public learned about it.

Here, we cannot easily dispel the people's bad impression about Trenas as the most despised mayor Iloilo City ever had. But again, he cited his victory last election as a continuing trust of the people towards him, Sad to say, but the people he refers to are today's poll-vendors!

In fact, majority of his supporters are now badly disillusioned and convinced that the mayor overtly professed what he covertly undertake. Worse, they also surpassed the atrocities committed by thieves of the previous administration.

Lowly City Hall employees are most sorely tempted to steal but don't, what a shame. Now they have to tolerate brave words to save face as the failed Iloilo City housing project in Pavia is already a vital document by which I can judge them.

Worse, other than that failed housing project, his nine years administration of the city has created a history of unabated anomaly and this is now a scroll that forms the basis of their blasphemy!