Sister cities summit eyed

CEBU, Philippines — Mayor Michael Rama wants to host a summit for all the sister cities of Cebu City to “bring about the rebirth” and “renewal” of what he called “people-to-people connectivity.”

“Bringing all sister cities in the whole world together in a summit so that we can bring about the re-birth, the renewal and the so-called people-to-people connectivity,” Rama said.

Cebu City used to have close to 20 sister cities abroad but only four remain active. Recently, Rama renewed the city’s sisterhood and friendly agreement with Vladivostok in Russia.

The three other active sister cities of Cebu City include Haarlemmermeer in the Netherlands, Xiamen in China, and Seattle, Washington in the U.S.

Karla Henry-Ammann, the executive director of the City’s Sister-City program, said they are now trying to re-connect with their other sister cities.

“We are trying to reconnect with all of our other sister cities that we’ve lost connection with because of the pandemic, and of course, change of administration, among other reasons,” said Ammann.

Ammann said they are doing their “best efforts” to reconnect with them all together this year.

Concerning the sister city summit that Rama is pushing, Ammann said it will come once they are already able to reconnect.

“What we want to do is we want to include all the sister cities in the summit…Once we establish that, we are hoping that we can do it next year, best efforts na gyud na, because under biya gyud mi sa guidance ni Mayor Mike nga ang nine years program, i-three years ra gyud,“ Ammann said.

Aside from that, Rama also told Councilor Joy Pesquerra to establish friendly ties with other cities in the world.  — (FREEMAN)