Rift between officials halts Capiz road rehab

ROXAS City – A rift between municipal officials has deprived the public of a road rehabilitation project.

Former President Roxas vice mayor Alfonso Golero opposed the ongoing road rehabilitation project of the provincial government in Barangay Cabug- cabug to Barangay Badiangon, President Roxas, Capiz. He said the property is titled under the name of Luisa Locsin.

Thus, t he provincial government t hrough t he provincial engineer’s office pulled out its equipment in the area.

Current mayor Recesilte Escolin said he was the prime target – and not the provincial government – of Golero’s opposition of the project.

“They don’t want that the people of President Roxas who voted for me will benefit from this project,” Escolin said, adding that the former official also opposes the construction of rural health and slaughterhouse buildings.

“They claimed that the construction sites were not yet donated to LGU [ local government unit] President Roxas despite the fact these projects were conceptualized during their term,” he added.

Golero, for his part, said the lands where the projects will be implemented are mostly owned by the family of former President Roxas mayor Raymund Locsin.

Though the lands were already covered by the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program, it has excluded roads from land coverage and distribution, he claimed.

“The road rehabilitation must be coordinated with the Locsin family or they could have invited me as the property administrator into a dialogue to resolve some issues concerning the status of the area,” Golero said in an interview.

In an interview with Engineer Edgar Agana, the 18-kilometer road traversing the barangays of President Roxas and Pilar municipalities is included in the list of provincial roads.

“Since time immemorial, it is the provincial government that maintains the road in question and it in fact it was already included in the Kalsada Program of the DILG [ Department of Interior and Local Government] but it was delisted because of the unresolved conflict between the incumbent and former officials of President Roxas,” Agana said.

Recently, Golero filed a case against Escolin before the Office of the Ombudsman Visayas for violation of the Revised Forestry Code of the Philippines and Anti-graft and Corrupt Practices Act for allegedly cutting at least 20 pieces of Indian trees within the municipal public plaza without a cutting permit.

The allegation, according to Escolin, was politically motivated.

Former mayor Raymund Locsin and Golero lost when they ran against the group of Escolin in the 2016 elections.