Ex-Cebu Mayor Osmeña told: ‘Don’t touch Duterte’s women’

MANILA, Philippines — Immediately after complaining about the appointment of then police colonel Royina Garma as Cebu City police chief, then mayor Tomas Osmeña received a terse warning: “Don’t touch the president’s women.”

According to the former mayor, he received the warning after he personally complained to then president Rodrigo Duterte at Malacañang in 2018 about Garma’s appointment.

Osmeña did not say how he received the warning.

He bared the warning he received from a source, whose identity he declined to reveal, during an interview with “Storycon” on One News yesterday, during which he also indicated that Garma was so influential in the previous administration that Duterte was practically “eating out of her hand.”

“When she was going to be appointed to Cebu City as chief of police, of course I have a natural interest. Somebody gave me a report from a PCSO (Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office) official that stated that when Garma was CIDG (Criminal Investigation and Detection Group) chief in Bohol, she was suspected of collecting P1 million a week from illegal gambling,” Osmeña recalled.

“That’s why I didn’t want to accept her, because of course, I just want to protect the people of Cebu,” he added.

Despite the mayor’s opposition, Garma still assumed the post, prompting Osmeña to reach out to Duterte.

“President Duterte told me, ‘why don’t you just tell Bong Go … everything, and we’ll look into it.’ I prepared documentation for Bong Go and of course nothing happened,” said the former mayor.

“And then somebody told me, ‘don’t touch the president’s women.’ I said, ‘what?’” he added.

Go, now a senator, was then special assistant to the president.

Osmeña declined to identify the person who gave him the warning. But he said it was the same person who tipped him off that Garma would be appointed as general manager of PCSO.

In June 2019, Garma – who then still had 10 years left before her retirement from the service – opted for early retirement. Duterte gave her the plum post at the PCSO a few days later.

A month earlier, Osmeña lost his reelection bid to then vice mayor Edgardo Labella, who ran under Duterte’s political party, PDP-Laban.

Osmeña, who locked