CITY CITY (April 27, 2024) – “They were courteous!”
Lawyer Joselito Thomas P. Baena so described the employees and security personnel on duty at the Metropolitan Cebu Water District (MCWD) when he visited its main office Friday.
It has been a week since the water utility’s interim board of directors (iBOD) appointed Baena as acting general manager (GM) while GM Edgar Donoso serves his 90-day preventive suspension.
However, in defying duly-constituted national authority, Donoso has since Monday, April 22, barred Baena from entering MCWD premises, upholding an illegal resolution of three suspended BOD members.
“Earlier today, I visited the premises of the MCWD main office to check our frontline services. I was assured that as far as frontline services are concerned, it is business as usual,” Baesa told Cebu City News through text.
He said he visited the area for customer payments and complaints.
“The security personnel of MCWD were courteous to me,” he added.
Baena said his visit was “in line with the stated objective of the national government” to monitor the operations of MCWD.
‘Corruption‘
The Local Water Utilities Administration (LWUA) intervened in the management and operations of MCWD over supposed defaults in loan servicing and failed delivery of commitments, including the recovery of non-revenue water (NRW).
Mayor Mike Rama, on the other hand, suspected corruption by suspended directors Jose Daluz III, Miguelito Pato and Judelyn Mae Seno over desalination projects and other water supply projects.
Rama asked LWUA mid last year to intervene and initially pose no objection to his relief of the three now suspended directors, but its previous administrator’s inaction compelled him to appoint their replacements.
He appointed retired Army Maj. Gen. Melquiades Feliciano, experienced government corporation policy-maker and executive Aristotle Batuhan and businessman Nelson Yuvallos, and retained lawyers Danilo Ortiz and Earl Bunachita.
The mayor opted to respect the recent LWUA intervention and its appointment of an iBOD but hopes to see his appointees assume office with the blessing of the country’s water regulatory agency.
No media, city, but AFP, PNP
Upholding his mandate, Baena said he is working “to assess how we can all move forward with primary focus on the consumers.”
It is also his intent “to see how we can help mitigate the effects of the severe water shortage,” he added.
Baena visited the MCWD headquarters “alone, no media, no one from the City Government. It was a low-key visit.”
But he acknowledged there were members of Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) at a distance “to secure me and ensure peace.”
On the same day of Baena’s silent visit, Mayor Rama reiterated his call for a water district exclusively for Cebu City and encouraged the local government units whose jurisdictions MCWD currently covers to go for their own water utility.
| RMN/cte
Cebu City • News & Information 