Rama to fight court order to pay Rallos heirs

CEBU, Philippines -  The Regional Trial Court (RTC) yesterday issued a notice of garnishment addressed to four depository banks of the Cebu City Government asking its managers to inform the court of how much money and properties the City has with their respective banks.

RTC Branch 9 Sheriff Antonio Bellones informed the managers of Philippine Postal Bank, Land Bank of the Philippines, Development Bank of the Philippines and Philippine Veterans Bank that the court needs P133,469,962 to be garnished by the court.

Bellones told the bank officials that the amount shall be also given to the heirs of Fr. Vicente Rallos as just compensation of the latter’s 4,654 square meter lots that were used by the city as road in barangay Sambag II, which is now named M.L. Aznar Road.

According to Bellones, the P133.4 million represents the unpaid balance of the just compensation of the lot, including the “interest and interest on interest, attorney’s fees and litigation expenses.”

But Mayor Michael Rama said he will fight it out before the court because he gathered new-found evidence to support the City’s claim that it would be unfair for the City to be compelled to pay for the road lot when the Rallos family agreed already to have it used as road.

Former Councilor Jocelyn Pesquera, who helped in digging up the old records of the concerned lot, had found that in 1940, the Rallos family had agreed to open the road in their property for the use of the family and the public.

“Nganong mobayad man g’yud ta aning yutaa nga sa wala pa sila mopasaka og kaso batok sa dakbayan daan na man diay kini nga gitagana para himoong karsada,” Rama said.

He quickly announced that City Hall is forming a legal team tasked to handle the matter. The team is composed of lawyers Leslie Reyes and Carlo Vincent Gemina of the City Legal Office and legal consultant Jade Ponce.

The three lawyers refused to say what their next move is to counter the notice of garnishment issued by the court.

There are two ways to stop garnishment. One, the concerned party could pay the outstanding judgment balance to the clerk of the court that issued the judgment, or second, the party can request for a hearing if it has some basis in law to have the garnishment overturned.

During the hearing, the judge will determine whether the objections are valid. If they are deemed valid, the garnishment order will be canceled or modified.

Rama said the court must not quickly issue writs of garnishments against the people’s money. – (FREEMAN)