Northern Mindanao || X Save CDO deadline for signatures set
Save CDO deadline for signatures set
Thursday, 02 February 2012 00:00
SAVE CDO Now plans to end its signature campaign to have Mayor Vicente Emano recalled by Feb. 14, Valentine's Day. Save CDO spokesperson Tito Mora announced this during a forum on the environment organized by the Cooperative Development Authority, Task Force Macajalar, and the Federation of Philippine Sustainable Development Cooperatives, last Tuesday. The citizens' group is pressed for time and has stepped up the campaign to gather some 100 thousand signatures for a petition for recall to be submitted to the Commission on Elections. The commission requires at least 45 thousand signatures before it can schedule a recall election in the city. Mora asked the help of cooperatives in the city, the same groups that gathered signatures for a petition that asked city hall to allow the Cagayan de Oro Water District (COWD) to be turned into a "people's cooperative."
"Let us practice our power to recall an elected official," Mora told representatives of the cooperatives. "We have set the deadline on Feb. 14. We have to review the accomplished recall forms first before submitting these to the Comelec on Feb. 22 for a decision," Mora said. He said his group is optimistic that it would be able to gather the required number on signatures on time. Save CDO has stepped up the daily signature campaign. It brought the campaign at the doorsteps of the St. Augustine Cathedral last Sunday. The group has been setting up desks at Divisoria every afternoon since last month where people can sign up.
But gathering signatures has not been a walk in the park for Save CDO. The group, for instance, declared six recall forms "spoiled" after discovering these were signed by only one person. Mora said his group is well aware of the moves and machinations allegedly employed by city hall to undermine the Save CDO recall effort, including a smear campaign and the use of "eyes and ears to monitor" the activities of the group. Volunteers complained of being bullied. Rhia Factura, one of the volunteers, said at least three men tried to intimidate members of her group at a Save CDO desk desk outside St. Augustine Cathedral last Sunday.
She posted on the page of a Facebook group: "While assisting two elderly women at my table, I noticed a tall and husky man in his early '50s staring at me as he spoke these intimidating words: 'Kaisug ba nimo nga mamugos sa tawo nga mopirma...' I was able to respond to him saying: 'Wala ko mamugos og papirma, sir. Ako naay katungod ug katungod usab sa mga tawo mo (desider) kun unsay makaayo sa ilang kaugmaon.'" Thirty minutes later, Factura said, two men came and falsely accused her of "forcing" people to sign. Mora reiterated that Save CDO volunteers have never forced nor intimidated anyone into signing the recall petition. He said the outcome of the 2010 elections have shown that over a hundred thousand voters in the city did not vote for Emano.
As of 2010, 284 thousand residents registered to vote. Under the Omnibus Election Code, Save CDO needs 25 percent of the total number of registered voters. "These are the registered voters we intend to reach out," Mora said. The campaign to recall Emano stemmed from city hall's widely perceived failure to prepare for a disaster and snail- paced response at the height of the devastation wrought by tropical storm Sendong last December. Emano was also accused of putting people in harm's way by making people build homes in flood-prone areas despite warnings from the environment department.
In the city alone, the Sendong floods claimed at least a thousand lives and a thousand more missing, now feared dead. The latest estimated cost of damages has been pegged at P1.6 billion, affected 1.14 million people and swept 14,883 houses. Pressed for comment, Emano said Mora's group should "hurry up because March is fast approaching."
Emano also chided Save CDO, saying its campaign has sown division among residents and delayed recovery and rehabilitation efforts. But Emano said he would "help" Save CDO in its campaign on condition that there would be an agreement that whoever loses in the recall election would stop the political intramurals. Mora gamely welcomed Emano's "offer." "We welcome the offer for a covenant. But it should include a moratorium on mining, his promise not to put residents in harm's way, his promise to be transparent in all of city hall's dealings and to put in the city's website the codified city ordinances," said Mora.
Based on the Local Government Code, voters have the power to recall their elective official for "loss of confidence." "Recall of any elective provincial, city, municipal, or barangay official may also be validly initiated upon petition of at least twenty-five percent (25%) of the total number of registered voters in the local government unit concerned during the election in which the local official sought to be recalled was elected," reads Chapter V, Sec. 70 (d) of RA 7160.
The petition for recall against Emano cited six grounds:
• for failure to implement measures to keep people out of harm's way;
• for consenting to the settlement of Isla de Oro and other areas identified by DENR as flood-prone and unfit for human habitation;
• for failure to act accordingly and warn and evacuate residents of flood- prone areas when Pagasa issued a weather advisory and typhoon warning;
• for failure to activate the city disaster management units immediately;
• for the decision to place the recovered bodies at the city dump site; and
• for not taking greater responsibility in overseeing the rescue, relief and rehabilitation of the affected residents.
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