MANILA, Philippines— An official of the Minor Basilica of the Black Nazarene or Quiapo Church said that this year’s procession or traslacion may only last for around 15 up to 16 hours.
Jonnaus Bautista, Quiapo Church social communications coordinator, said the procession may conclude faster this year because of the shorter route.
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The procession in 2019 lasted for 21 hours.
Quiapo Church officials earlier said the Black Nazarene procession would pass through a slightly different route through the Ayala Bridge instead of Jones bridge.
The traslacion has been using the Jones Bridge route for years.
According to Bautista, the church officials are ready in case the devotees would divert the route of procession.
Last Tuesday, Metro Manila Development Authority spokesperson Celine Pialago said they would place 20-feet-high containers vans in parts of the procession route so devotees would not stray from the route.
She added that they would place concrete barriers on these container vans.
Aside from these security barriers, the Philippine National Police would add barbed wires on Ayala Bridge to keep devotees from jumping off it.
The Traslacion that commemorates the transfer of the image of the Black Nazarene from its old home in Intramuros, Manila to Quiapo Church is slated for January 9, Thursday.
More than 13,000 police personnel would be deployed in Manila to secure the millions of devotees.
Bautista said around 6 million devotees are expected to join this year’s traslacion.
Last year, around 1.3 million devotees participated in the annual religious event.