Not again!
Not again!
Posted 10:43pm (Mla time) Feb 07, 2005
By Bambi Harper
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A15 of the February 8, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
YOU won't believe it, but they're at it again. (I once referred to them as "black dwarfs" and got a resounding protest about racial slurs, so now we'll just name names.) Some years back, there was hue and cry among idiots concerned with issues like conserving the environment, saving Manila Bay (one of those lost causes as you can see), restoring old buildings or trying to save them when the Department of Public Works and Highways started constructing this monstrous bridge across the Loboc River in Bohol.
To be fair, we're short on infrastructure, so this wasn't necessarily a bad thing except that this rather ugly structure (okay, okay so it's a matter of taste) was going to end up slicing the 200-year-old Loboc church right down its middle. Not only that, all that pounding was weakening its foundations. Happily, Mr. Toledo (I think that was his name) saw the light just like St. Paul and stopped the construction. I understand it has been christened something like "Tommy's folly" and it stands there unfinished -- a monument to government's incapacity to understand anything that isn't concerned with pork barrel and the like. Although it defiles the bucolic landscape, it apparently can't be demolished because it would cost several million pesos to do so. (Maybe they can bomb it?)
Having breathed a sigh of relief since there are so few victories in this arena, it turns out the DPWH is at it again. This time it's the town of Baclayon in Bohol. (What's with this island anyway?) Nine homeowners of ancestral homes sent a letter last January to the regional director of the Environment Management Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources based in Cebu, protesting a road-widening project that would result in partial or full destruction of their houses even though they had been "assured by Gov. Eric Aumentado that none of the ancestral homes in Baclayon will be demolished to give way to the widening project. However, in a meeting yesterday with the DPWH in the municipal hall of Baclayon, we have been informed that the ancestral homes will have to be destroyed."
Seeing that they were getting nowhere despite several letters to the DENR, they've even written to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo asking her to intervene, explaining that "Baclayon is the oldest ‘cabisera’ in the heritage province of Bohol" (not that the DPWH gives two hoots about heritage issues) and that even part of the belfry of the church complex would be affected.
Obviously no one is against progress or modernization, but these townspeople feel that the tangible heritage affected is part of the cultural heritage of the community and should remain for future generations. What the DPWH fails to take into account is that we have few enough examples of vernacular architecture and what would disappear is unique to Bohol. The homeowners also feel that "Bohol's claim to be one of our country's most exemplary provinces for eco-cultural (preservation) will surely be diminished if part of its enviable legacy of ancestral homes will vanish into thin air." So why can't the plan be redesigned?
Next comes Dr. Benito Legarda who is upset with the tourism office of Mabalacat, Pampanga, putting up a statue to kamikaze pilots. If this weren't so pathetic, it would be funny -- at par with Americans erecting a statue of Osama bin Laden on the site of the World Trade Center or the Jews honoring Adolph Hitler with a memorial in Jerusalem. The sad part is that the mayor can't see the ludicrousness of the situation or that it makes all of us the butt of jokes and a laughing stock, because who puts up statues to murderous foes? I mean have we lost all vestiges of sensibility and discernment as to what is proper? Don't get me wrong. I believe in forgiveness, but I don't believe in honoring enemies for their acts in wartime. So please, could the people of Mabalacat kindly remove the eyesore? Thank you.
Then there's my favorite senator, a.k.a. Flash Gordon, who insists on installing a gold statue of Arnold Schwarzenegger, oops, Lapu-Lapu, in Rizal Park. Listen: I have nothing against the favorite son of Cebu (I may not agree with the artistic attributes of the piece, but there's that "de gustibus" stuff, and what can we do if so many people are tasteless) but there is also apparently a law that reserves the park for heroes of the 1996 Revolution. (Too bad the National Historical Institute won't sue). If the good senator wishes to put up statues to every single hero from here to kingdom come in Rizal Park, then will he please first amend the law? Because what he is really demonstrating is an utter disdain for the law of the land that we ordinary mortals have to put up with whether we agree or not, and all because being senator, he can get away with it and who's going to do anything about it? The fact, of course, that the new tourism secretary hails from Cebu makes it much harder since this is the type of stunt politicians like to pull in order to curry favor this time, I presume, with the Cebuanos. Perhaps Secretary Ace Durano who is so much younger can show some respect for the law and request for its removal since Rizal Park is under his department.
It's true the headlines crow about the 6 percent growth and the booming stock market and the appreciation of the peso, but the feeling persists that we're going to hell in a basket. With the examples our leaders set, can you blame us?
Posted 10:43pm (Mla time) Feb 07, 2005
By Bambi Harper
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A15 of the February 8, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
YOU won't believe it, but they're at it again. (I once referred to them as "black dwarfs" and got a resounding protest about racial slurs, so now we'll just name names.) Some years back, there was hue and cry among idiots concerned with issues like conserving the environment, saving Manila Bay (one of those lost causes as you can see), restoring old buildings or trying to save them when the Department of Public Works and Highways started constructing this monstrous bridge across the Loboc River in Bohol.
To be fair, we're short on infrastructure, so this wasn't necessarily a bad thing except that this rather ugly structure (okay, okay so it's a matter of taste) was going to end up slicing the 200-year-old Loboc church right down its middle. Not only that, all that pounding was weakening its foundations. Happily, Mr. Toledo (I think that was his name) saw the light just like St. Paul and stopped the construction. I understand it has been christened something like "Tommy's folly" and it stands there unfinished -- a monument to government's incapacity to understand anything that isn't concerned with pork barrel and the like. Although it defiles the bucolic landscape, it apparently can't be demolished because it would cost several million pesos to do so. (Maybe they can bomb it?)
Having breathed a sigh of relief since there are so few victories in this arena, it turns out the DPWH is at it again. This time it's the town of Baclayon in Bohol. (What's with this island anyway?) Nine homeowners of ancestral homes sent a letter last January to the regional director of the Environment Management Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources based in Cebu, protesting a road-widening project that would result in partial or full destruction of their houses even though they had been "assured by Gov. Eric Aumentado that none of the ancestral homes in Baclayon will be demolished to give way to the widening project. However, in a meeting yesterday with the DPWH in the municipal hall of Baclayon, we have been informed that the ancestral homes will have to be destroyed."
Seeing that they were getting nowhere despite several letters to the DENR, they've even written to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo asking her to intervene, explaining that "Baclayon is the oldest ‘cabisera’ in the heritage province of Bohol" (not that the DPWH gives two hoots about heritage issues) and that even part of the belfry of the church complex would be affected.
Obviously no one is against progress or modernization, but these townspeople feel that the tangible heritage affected is part of the cultural heritage of the community and should remain for future generations. What the DPWH fails to take into account is that we have few enough examples of vernacular architecture and what would disappear is unique to Bohol. The homeowners also feel that "Bohol's claim to be one of our country's most exemplary provinces for eco-cultural (preservation) will surely be diminished if part of its enviable legacy of ancestral homes will vanish into thin air." So why can't the plan be redesigned?
Next comes Dr. Benito Legarda who is upset with the tourism office of Mabalacat, Pampanga, putting up a statue to kamikaze pilots. If this weren't so pathetic, it would be funny -- at par with Americans erecting a statue of Osama bin Laden on the site of the World Trade Center or the Jews honoring Adolph Hitler with a memorial in Jerusalem. The sad part is that the mayor can't see the ludicrousness of the situation or that it makes all of us the butt of jokes and a laughing stock, because who puts up statues to murderous foes? I mean have we lost all vestiges of sensibility and discernment as to what is proper? Don't get me wrong. I believe in forgiveness, but I don't believe in honoring enemies for their acts in wartime. So please, could the people of Mabalacat kindly remove the eyesore? Thank you.
Then there's my favorite senator, a.k.a. Flash Gordon, who insists on installing a gold statue of Arnold Schwarzenegger, oops, Lapu-Lapu, in Rizal Park. Listen: I have nothing against the favorite son of Cebu (I may not agree with the artistic attributes of the piece, but there's that "de gustibus" stuff, and what can we do if so many people are tasteless) but there is also apparently a law that reserves the park for heroes of the 1996 Revolution. (Too bad the National Historical Institute won't sue). If the good senator wishes to put up statues to every single hero from here to kingdom come in Rizal Park, then will he please first amend the law? Because what he is really demonstrating is an utter disdain for the law of the land that we ordinary mortals have to put up with whether we agree or not, and all because being senator, he can get away with it and who's going to do anything about it? The fact, of course, that the new tourism secretary hails from Cebu makes it much harder since this is the type of stunt politicians like to pull in order to curry favor this time, I presume, with the Cebuanos. Perhaps Secretary Ace Durano who is so much younger can show some respect for the law and request for its removal since Rizal Park is under his department.
It's true the headlines crow about the 6 percent growth and the booming stock market and the appreciation of the peso, but the feeling persists that we're going to hell in a basket. With the examples our leaders set, can you blame us?
posted by Dante at 7:15 PM
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