Delicadeza for Rodriguez in Miss Cebu mess

The recent news report that Cebu City Tourism Commissioner and Miss Cebu chair, Philip Rodriguez, is not stepping down at the wake of the scandal because nobody asked him to smacks of insensibility.

Whatever happened to "delicadeza?"

But I'm not really surprised. A relative who covered the first Miss Cebu pageant (it used to be Miss Cebu Tourism before that) in a local paper got flack for writing that there were "boos and booboos" during coronation night, a fact reported in the other newspapers.

A lady commissioner confronted him after the article came out. He stood by what he wrote and retracted not a word, but quickly sent a note to the lady apologizing for the hurt feelings he may have caused. That, of course, is delicadeza, simply put - a consideration for others without compromising one's own integrity.

Rodriguez must step down to signify that he has no vested self-interest in the Miss Cebu search, and that to face charges - de facto and de jure - on his own terms without having to hide behind the cloak of his quasi-governmental position as Cebu City Tourism Commissioner.

Yet Philip Rodriguez must already know this. His years of serving Cebu's creme de la creme as dress designer should have taught him a thing or two about delicacy of manners and action.