By Mar-Vic Cagurangan
Variety News Staff

SENATOR Ben Pangelinan, D-Barrigada, yesterday offered another proposal to allow partial payment of the cost of living allowances, this time by authorizing Gov. Felix P. Camacho to arrange a $10 million line of credit with lending institutions.
The present law allows the governor to borrow a maximum of $6 million from lending institutions. Pangelinan has filed a resolution that would increase the governor’s maximum credit limit to $10 million.
The resolution seeks to allow the government to partially fulfill its $123 million obligation to 4,000 retirees, who stand to receive their COLA payments after winning a 13-year court battle.
Late last year, the governor signed a bill that would allow him to tap four special accounts—the Territorial Highway Construction Funds, the Tourist Attraction Fund, the GTA Privatization Fund, and the Interim Transition Office Fund—for partial payments of the COLA. As of Sept. 30, these special funds have a combined balance of about $23 million.
Despite the enactment of the COLA bill, none of the retirees has received payment, and the law has receded to the background.
The administration’s new proposal, Bill 23, which would authorize the government to enter into a $123.8 million loan agreement with a Bank of Guam-led consortium, is awaiting action in the legislative committee on taxation, finance and commerce.
The fate of Bill 23 is purportedly dependent on the bond borrowing case pending at the U.S. Supreme Court, which is facing the question involving the debt limits set by the Organic Act. The nation’s high court is expected to come up with a decision in June.