Rama laments lack of support for CCMC

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama has expressed his sentiments to Budget Secretary Florencio Abad over the national government’s lack of support to the local government’s effort to reconstruct the Cebu City Medical Center after it was damaged by the magnitude 7.2 earthquake that hit the Visayas regions in October 2013.

Rama raised this concern as well as on other infrastructure projects that need funding from the national government during the Bottom-up Budgeting Forum attended by Abad at the Sotogrande Hotel in Mactan, Lapu-Lapu City yesterday. The forum was attended by 105 mayors in Central Visayas.Rama lamented that he made the request on October 20, 2013, days after the powerful quake hit Visayas, but until now the P1.5 billion budget that he asked for has not been given.

The mayor also conveyed to Abad the need to build more bridges that will link Cebu to its neighboring provinces like Bohol and Negros. He also asked for the construction of another airport in Medellin town in northern Cebu.

Abad admitted that the CCMC reconstruction project is not among the priorities of the national government. He said that Rama should have raised this concern to the Office of the Presidential Assistant for Rehabilitation and Recovery and to the Department of Health since it is a city hospital.

“He really should be addressing himself to OPARR kasi nagpunta dito ang OPARR and that should have been covered by the assessment as well as the list of the infrastructures and I think the proper agency is the Department of Health, kasi ospital eh,”Abad said.

Abad said that the priorities under the 2015 budget include social protection of the poor with P64 billion; basic education (P450 billion); public health (P93 billion); and infrastructure (P400 billion).

“Yun yung mga priorities ng gobyerno,” Abad said.

Abad, however, is sold out to the idea of having another bridge project in Cebu.

“A lot of developments are centered in Luzon in NCR or mega Manila they say, but for the country to continue to expand and grow, we should dispersed that growth to include Visayas and Mindanao and one of the critical requirements of Visayas and Mindanao is interconnectivity, yung physical transport such as train, roads, airport because the benefits will cross boundaries, it will benefit one region to another,” Abad said.

Abad said that bridge projects are already included in the national budget. He promised that bigger allocation will be given for the Visayas and Mindanao. — (FREEMAN)