The FLI offer is a gem

We all have read of the seeming fall of the economic dominoes throughout the world. It's an hour-to-hour development presented to our view by international cable companies courtesy of the advances in telecommunications. With the American government being reported yesterday as having hesitated (my coinage, actually) to approve the proposed bail-out of the distressed financial institution, the picture is getting more unsettling and the other capital markets are not just jittery. They are gripped with unprecedented amount of fear.

I write this article today on the assumption that the offer made by the Filinvest Land Inc., to Cebu City, thru His Honor, Mayor Tomas R. Osmeña, to develop a fairly large portion of the South Real Properties (the south reclamation area) stands unaffected by the economic woes worldwide. I assume, too, that Filinvest made this offer after a very careful study conducted over a period of time that must have antedated the bankruptcy of the Lehman Brothers. In other words, I assume that despite the rapidly changing, mostly distressing, picture of the world financial market, FLI does not flinch on its plan of investing in our city.

To confess, we have no access to the documents of this gem of an "offer". These would have been the best evidence of what it contains. Parenthetically, we have only read the news report heralding this investment proposal. Surely, the newspaper accounts must have been either spoon fed by city hall and Filinvest sources or picked up from some obvious provisions of the "offer".

Let us take note that Filinvest plans to buy ten hectares of the reclaimed land for two billion pesos. In quick calculation, the offered purchase price per square meter is about twenty thousand pesos. This sum is almost double the earlier projections aired by the mayor. I could recall that the sale by the city of a lot called the city-hall block at the north reclamation area is for a much lower amount. It was a give away price maybe because we were just cash strapped.

The offer by this company to develop additional forty hectares will have multiplier effects. Suppliers and contractors will swarm FLI. Businesses will be set up to support them. More importantly, the development of this area brings the remaining portions of the reclaimed area, otherwise outside of the Filinvest field, within the radar of other investors.

For quite a long while, the city has starved. Hobbled by its burden of paying the huge debt spawned by the SRP project, it could not fully address the diverse needs of the city. We could not solve the recurring floods with finality. Our city streets in the urban area, lights and signs have seen better days. The roads in the mountains have made travel more arduous. The medical center has continued to suffer from fiscal restraints. To name some basic services.

Without being mean to other affected entities, they be governments or government owned or controlled corporations or private institutions, the City of Cebu should quickly cash in on the FLI package. This is the time Mayor Osmeña and the Cebuanos have been waiting for and our mayor should seize this awesome opportunity. In fact, it comes at the most opportune occasion because while other jurisdictions bow under the weight of dire financial difficulties or in the meantime hedge on what o do in this crisis, this heavy investment will lead our city to some kind of economic break-out. It will make our economic atmosphere singularly bullish.

On the part of the critics, including the opposition, who, by the way, has no warm body in the city council, if only to advance the city's interest, they should give the mayor all needed assistance without losing their vigilance over undesirable segments of the FLI plan. Of course, knowing the brash character of Mayor Osmeña, I believe he is likely to shoo them away like unwanted pests. But, it will not do his duty as a mayor any good. It is a better proposition for him to temper his arrogance and listen to the vigilant positions of those not in his shelter. He needs his critics because his own men have unquestionably demonstrated that they are lapdogs unable to offer any sound dissent.

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