Cebu City Execs Ask Court to Rule on Case on Use of PHP8.3B Sale of SRP Lots

Cebu City officials have asked the court to rule on the case concerning the use of the PHP8.3-billion down payment from the sale of the 45.2-hectare lot at the South Road Properties (SRP) so as not to delay the delivery of basic services.

This was contained in an opposition to the urgent motion for reconsideration filed by lawyer Romulo Torres over the Cebu City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 9’s decision denying the issuance of a temporary restraining order for the use of the money.

The members of the Cebu City Council, who are the respondents of the case, through the City Legal Office, want the court to deny Torres’ motion.

They also want the court to deny Torres’ request to have the case turned back to the judge who previously handled it, Judge Generosa Labra of RTC Branch 23, as it contradicts Torres’ claim that his motion is urgent.

Labra had inhibited himself from the case, saying Torres is a close friend.

“Respondents ask this honorable court to treat the present case with dispatch lest public service continues to be hampered and delayed,” said city lawyers Jerone Castillo and Mary Rose Salvatierra in their comment dated Oct. 28.

The lawyers said the motion of Torres should already be denied because it is a “mere scrap of paper” that does not deserve judicial cognizance.

Technicality is among the reasons the lawyers cited, considering that they don’t have an official copy of Torres’ motion yet even though the court has set the hearing of the case last Oct. 23.

Castillo and Salvatierra said a motion required to be heard by the court should be served to the other concerned party first at least three days prior to the date of hearing as provided for under the Rules of Court.

Invoking a Supreme Court jurisprudence, the lawyers said the three-day notice is mandatory so that the other party will be given enough time to study the motion.

“A motion that does not comply with the requirements of the Rules of Court is a worthless piece of paper which the clerk of court has no right to receive and which the court has no authority to act upon,” they said. (PNA) LAP/EB/EDS