The entire officialdom of Lamitan,Basilan has expressed sadness over the report that the Supreme Court has reversed its earlier decision on the cityhood issue by acceding to the petition of the League of Cities in the Philippines (LCP) to declare as unconstitutional the conversion of the 16 towns, including Lamitan.

But since no official document yet received by the Lamitan local government, Mayor Roderick Furigay and lawyer Quirino Esguerra Jr. have preferred not to issue any statement to the media relative to the High Court new cityhood decision.

Based media reports last week, Supreme Court (SC) voted 7-6 to uphold its November 18, 2008 decision nullifying all laws that seek for the conversion of the 16 towns into cities.

However, Lamitan Councilor Joaquin Puri Jr. said the Lamitan Council is expected to tackle the issue during today’s regular session and probably come up with measures expressing their sentiment over the recent SC decision.

Should this happen, Puri said their lined-up infrastructure projects, delivery of social services to the people, livelihood programs and many others will surely be affected because of the reduction of their Internal Revenue Allotment (IRA).

Even two of Lamitan’s recently elected councilors, particularly the number 9 and 10, will be displaced if the town will be reverted back to municipality since the law requires only eight slots for councilors.

In May 2007 election, 10 councilors have been elected but after the SC decision, two of them (Clarito San Juan as the number 9 councilor and Jaime Ortega as the number 10) face removal from their positions.

When Republic Act 9393 (converting the status of Lamitan into a component city in the ARMM) was approved in 2007, Puri said its IRA went up to almost P300 million, an annual budget enough to finance some of the town’s priority projects.

After the High Court decided in favor of the petition of the LCP in November 18, 2008, the 16 towns represented by its lawyer, former Solicitor General Estelito Mendoza, filed a Motion for Reconsideration that resulted to the December of 2009 ruling declaring the laws the convert the concerned towns into cities as constitutional.

Since the decision was appealable, LCP asked SC through another motion to reconsider its earlier decision. The decision came out last week favoring the petition of the LCP.

LCP had questioned the legality of the laws seeking the conversion of the 16 towns into cities considering they (16 towns) failed to meet one basic requirement under the Local Government Code.

RA 7160 or the Local Government Code of 1992 requires an annual income of P20 million before a town/municipality be converted into a city. However, this provision of the law was amended later making it from P20 million to P100 million.

Before its conversion, Lamitan was earning just more than P20 million a year as its local revenues, good enough to qualify them to be a component city following the original provision of the law.

Councilor Puri said that long before the amendment of the law, Lamitan, through then Congressman Gerry Salapuddin filed the necessary bill in Congress.

It was very unfortunate that the proposed bill was not acted upon during former President Joseph Estrada’s administration because of the controversial impeachment proceedings filed against him, Puri said.

Its approval, however, came out in 2007, years after the law was amended.

The 16 towns sought for an exemption and the High Court ruled in favor of them, but LCP pursued the case that resulted to a long debate among the justices.

“We are very sad after learning of the latest decision. But we cannot commend yet because we have not yet received any official document from the Supreme Court. Definitely, this is a bad news for the Lamitenos,” Puri lamented.