EDITORIAL - Not up to Tomas when to observe or not the law

Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña, who once admitted he “may have inspired” extra-judicial killings, has again shown a seeming tendency to gloss over the law, a trait undesirable in one mandated to uphold it, and especially if that one seeks to become a crafter of laws.

A fleet of city-owned “Kaohsiung” buses ferrying streetchildren to a summer outing was stopped by police yesterday in Barili for traveling without registration papers and license plates.

As head of a local government unit, Osmeña should have made sure all city-owned vehicles are duly-registered and have the proper plates. But not only did he apparently fail in that, he now seems to want to gloss over the fact and instead blame the incident on politics.

It is no secret that Osmeña and Cebu Governor Gwen Garcia are at loggerheads. Still, that does not eliminate the fact that the buses were traveling illegally. So, even if Garcia had a hand in their apprehension, it would not have been wrong for her to do so and uphold the law.

On the other hand, Osmeña, who seems to have a gift for side-tracking an issue, tried to court the sympathy of the public by crying crocodile tears over the fact that the children missed their lunch because of the apprehension.

The apprehension did not cause the children to miss their lunch. Since they were going on an outing, the kids had their lunch with them. If they did miss their lunch, then Osmeña should fire the kids’ official chaperons for not letting them eat when it was time for them to do so.

On the other hand, the police in the province should not stop with just the “Kaohsiung” buses. They should also be on the lookout for other Cebu City vehicles traveling outside the city without proper registrations or license plates.

It is time to show the mayor, who once went over the authority of the city council in giving the go signal to two private contractors to pursue a highly controversial towing ordinance, that observance of the law is never a matter of his personal discretion.