More about Jerry and me

Hole of Justice

By Peter G. Jimenea

More about Jerry and me

A lot of people had been asking why I dislike Cong. Jerry Trenas in most articles I wrote about him. They failed to know that I’m with the man when he first ran for mayor but lost. But after he won later as city mayor, he has done nothing for nine years except, to enrich himself at the expense of the taxpayers.

Mr. Danny Fajardo, the publisher of a local daily in Western Visayas disagreed. He did not inquire as they are friends. But now he does, after he transferred venue of his TV program and learned that then Mayor Trenas has no accomplished valuable-project whatsoever for the past nine years!

The Trenas Boulevard along the Iloilo River that he named after his father is not a city project but part of the Japan Flood Control Program for the province. The same is true with two fly-over constructed in the city which were projects of national government fund.

At the start of his first term as elected mayor in 2001, Mayor Trenas pushed-through only a hand-over project from former Mayor Mansueto Malabor, the construction of the Iloilo Terminal Market where a P17M was immediately released without the public getting wind of it.

Also in year 2001, Trenas implemented another project of former Mayor Malabor, the construction of 413 units of Low-Cost Houses for the poor city hall employees in the city government property at Pavia, Iloilo. It was bankrolled by a P120M loan from the PNB.

The term of payment for the contractor‘s billing is direct to the bank and crooks find no money in this transaction. So all of a sudden the loan obligation of the city government with PNB was transferred to the PVB. On why, your guess is as good as mine, but it incurred a travel cost of P12M for such a walking distance!

Sad to say, the contractor’s use of substandard materials was discovered. Thus, the city council passed a unanimous resolution urging Mayor Trenas to rescind the contract and sue Alex Trinidad the contractor. The latter, however, abandoned the project without a unit completed out of the 413 houses in contract with the city government.

Surprisingly, Trenas continued paying Trinidad’s billing in millions and the daily interest for the loan at P17,000 a day including holidays. Imagine how much we spent for over a year? The stepping over the line of pardonable behavior is understandable among public officials in bondage of indebtedness.

But this abuse of the taxpayers’ money is injustice that cries to God for vengeance. Look, despite the residual imperfection in the contractor’s billings their will was done. But the payments are tainted with grave abuse of discretion as not even one of the 413 units under contract was completely built by the contractor.

Trenas also ordered the old city hall building demolished not on the bid price of P800 but for a higher cost of P1.2M on negotiated contract. But in common practice, the contractor pays the owner for his would-be demolished buildings. On why he did otherwise, we have yet to know. But remnant of the old city hall building in millions is nowhere to be found!

What’s more, he rented the third floor of a mall where city employees are holding offices. As to the rent, nobody knows.  But why demolish the old city hall building when it is still of use for hundreds of city employee now renting office in a mall?

The ongoing construction of the new City Hall building is what got us so mad about. The original cost of P350M is already enough according to Trenas to finish it.  But he secretly applied and got a new loan of P105M for the same purpose. Hiding it from the public’s irreverent gaze is bad, but acquiring it without authority from the city council is worse.

Liar, he can only be. I’ll bet my balls that former Mayor Trenas has no project to crow about whatsoever from 2001 to 2009. I also tend to agree with his critics claim that he is the most despised mayor this city ever had. His constituents have nothing to remind them of him but absurd legacy. Here, the tragedy is not to go but having no one to remember you!