Nerissa hits Jonas over pay increase

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu sixth district Representative Nerissa Soon-Ruiz yesterday hit Mandaue City Mayor Jonas Cortes for requesting the City Council to appropriate funds for the increase in wages of the city’s job order employees.

“This is clearly a form of early vote buying,” Soon-Ruiz said in a statement sent to The Freeman yesterday.

Soon-Ruiz, who declared her intention to run for mayor in the 2010 elections, said she sees the bulk of Cortes’ request for supplemental budget is intended for the coming elections.

“It is also meant to buy the support of the 2,000 or more job order employees, who are political appointees of the mayor,” the congresswoman said.

Soon Ruiz said of the P1.7 billion that the City Council appropriated for the mayor’s projects over the last two years, the mayor spent around P300 million to pay for the job order employees.

Soon-Ruiz said there are over 300,000 Mandauehanons and yet the mayor spent over 20 percent of the P1.7 billion to pay for the job order employees.

“I’m appalled by his kind of management style to prioritize the needs of his 2,000 or more JOs who are his political appointees over the majority of the Mandauehanons,” Soon-Ruiz said.

Mandaue City Administrator Briccio Boholst countered that the 1,789 job order employees include those hired by the council, saying that the congresswoman is also accusing her allies in the council.

“These daily wage earners deserve the long overdue increase which the members of the council also agreed because the said employees are also doing public service,” Boholst said in a statement.

Soon-Ruiz is alluding that the whole council is buying votes and that the employees and even the Mandauehanons can be bought.

“This only shows how narrow-minded the congresswoman is,” Boholst said, adding that the council led by Soon-Ruiz’s protégé, Vice Mayor Carlo Fortuna, is using the job order employees for politicking.

To recall, Cortes announced during the unveiling of the Citizen’s Charter and launching of the Anti-Red Tape Program that he included in the supplemental budget the increase in the salaries of job order employees effective July 1. — Mitchelle L. Palaubsanon/LPM  (THE FREEMAN)