Alas, Filipinos remember only the bad things!

For the last 14 years, every month of June is for the Cebu Chamber of Commerce & Industry, Inc. (CCCI) Cebu Business Month (CBM). We’re now on our 10th year in Straight from the Sky and for the past 10 years, we’ve made it a tradition to feature CBM’s various activities. Their theme for this year is “Get Inspired! Go Green.” The big event for the CBM is the 15th Tourism Congress: Explore Cebu, with opening ceremonies at 8:20am on June 23 at the Cebu International Convention Center (CICC).

The CBM will also feature the 2nd season of P.E.O.P.L.E. Success stories on June 26 at 4pm to 6pm at the SM Cinema I and the Arts and Culture launching at 4pm, June 5 at the Ayala Center. With us tonight are the workhorses behind the CCCI and CBM: Pres. Sammy Chioson, CBM chairman Felix Taqiuam, co-chair Dennis Wong and Cebu Tourism chair Dr. Mila Espina. Watch this very interesting show on SkyCable’s channel 15 at 8:00pm so you can be apprised of what’s happening with the CBM and the Tourism Congress.

* * *

You might have seen that tv advertisement that gave details of the various infrastructure projects done under the Arroyo Administration, which at the end claims that Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA) has done more for infrastructure projects than all the previous presidents combined. I fully concur with that tv ad.

Just last Thursday, PGMA came to Cebu in what was perhaps her last official visit here as President in order to inaugurate the P1.625-billion 1.23 kilometer subway tunnel that would finally complete the South Road Project linking downtown Cebu City to the City of Talisay. I gathered that this is the country’s first ever tunnel of this size and magnitude. Like the SRP, this could never have materialized unless PGMA pushed it. For the record, our good friend, the late Press Secretary Cerge M. Remonde also did his part in making sure this project would be constructed and finished.

We know why those tv ads have been appearing lately. Pres. Arroyo wants the Filipino people to remember her as the President who did more roads and bridges during her watch. I don’t blame her PR people for making a last ditch effort to remind the Filipino people of all the good things that Pres. Arroyo has done during her term. I agree that credit should be given where credit is due. But alas, the problem with us Filipinos is, we tend to remember only the bad things that happened to our Presidents and forget the good things that they did.

* * *

At long last, the Cebu City Council approved an ordinance creating the Cebu City Transportation Office (CCTO) from the Cebu City Traffic Operations and Management (CITOM), which has always been under the Office of the Mayor. This has always been one of our dreams, to turn CITOM into a Department because traffic management is a full-time job, which is manned by people who ought to have the proper tenure of service.

When I took the chairmanship of CITOM from year 2001 to 2004 (I was always a director since 1988) what I found very uncomfortable was the reality that the majority of our traffic enforcers were mere casuals whose tenure was always renewable every three months. This could never happen in the private sector, where after 6 months of continued service, we either not accept them as our employees or accept them as full time employees. I just hope that when this ordinance is signed into a law, we shall see fewer casuals running the Traffic Department.

When the late Councilor Rogelio “Jing Jing” Osmeña was alive, he sponsored this ordinance, but somehow it never materialized. When this ordinance becomes law, I’m sure Jing Jing will be smiling up there. I guess the reason this ordinance took so long is the lack of political will to turn CITOM into a department it deserves. This also means that when it becomes a department, volunteers like me who take on the job of chairman without a single centavo in remuneration can no longer happen because there are Civil Service rules when it comes to department heads from LGUs.

Let me be the first to congratulate the Cebu City Council for passing this ordinance, which I hope that incoming Mayor Michael Rama would sign into a law as one of his first acts as Mayor of Cebu City. But while we anxiously wait for this to happen, I would like to call upon CITOM officials to fix our traffic lights as many are already busted. A case in point is the traffic light at the corner Escario St. and Juaña Osmeña St. They don’t have to wait to become a department before they can get these lights fixed.

* * *

Email: [email protected]