CEBU, Philippines – For Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Paz Radaza, it is high time that the city sit in the Mactan-Cebu International Airport Authority (MCIAA) board, considering that the airport is inside the city.
“Kinahanglan na gyod siguro naay representation and it is high time for us to ask for a seat at the board,” Radaza told reporters.
The reason why Lapu-Lapu City was not included in the MCIAA board can be traced back to the incumbency of then governor Lito Osmeña and the late mayor Maximo Patalinghug when the board was created and the city was excluded from the MCIAA.
Since Lapu-Lapu City was just a component city then of the province, it was decided that the governor should choose who from the private sector should sit in the MCIAA board because Cebu Province hosts the airport.
For more than a decade, Lapu-Lapu and the MCIAA board disagreed on the city’s taxing power over the airport.
But with the mayor’s husband in congress, former mayor Arturo Radaza, Paz Radaza said she will ask the congressman to review the MCIAA charter so that Lapu-Lapu will have a representation in the board.
“Dili ba, insulting kaayo nga wala’y taga Lapu-Lapu City nga naa sa MCIAA board?” Mayor Radaza said.
Former congressman Raul del Mar authored the MCIAA Charter or Republic Act 6958 in the 9th Congress.
Since del Mar was an ally of former governor Emilio “Lito” Osmeña, the governor’s political rival Maximo Patalinghug, then mayor of Lapu-Lapu City, was not given a seat in the MCIAA board. (THE FREEMAN)