We get crumbs while Manila gets the cheese!

I just learned that a Cebuano musical icon, Maestro “Mil” Villareal passed away in Canada last Sept.13, 2011 at 2:27am Philippine time. Emilio apparently succumbed to an asthma attack. He was 90 years old. The Villarreals were our neighbors since the early 60s, living at the corner road in Juaña Osmeña Ext. before they moved to Canada.

Maestro Mil was musical director in Cebu Broadcasting (DYRC) for many years when it was still along Osmeña Blvd and Ma. Cristina St. and he composed hundreds of Cebuano songs, amongst the more popular were “Langit ug Yuta, Veronica and Bisan sa Damgo Lang, which was popularized by Asia’s Queen of Song, Pilita Corrales. Maestro Mil was very recently honored by the Jose “Dodong” Gullas Foundation for his musical contribution to the improvement of Cebuano culture. His Cebuano songs no doubt will immortalize his name in the hearts of Cebuanos.

Maestro Mil left his wife Enriqueta and nine children and a host of grandchildren, two of whom are very close to me, Chito who works with Philippine Airlines (PAL) and Ernest Villareal. May I request the pious reader to please pray for the repose of his soul.

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While we in Cebu are busy fighting over the issue of whether or not we should install a flyover at our critical intersections, I just got information from the Office of Sen. Franklin Drilon that the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) is already eyeing a very ambitious project… to build a 22-kilometer elevated highway along the entire stretch of the Epifanio delos Santos Avenue (EDSA) in order to address the traffic congestion in Metro Manila as EDSA passes from Parañaque, Makati, San Juan to Balintawak in Quezon City! If you ask me, this project is not just a simple flyover over a snarled intersection… but a whole elevated road network!

The estimated cost of this project is around P50 billion and mind you, DPWH Secretary Rogelio Singson is even toying around with the idea of building a Stormwater Management and Road Tunnel (SMART) system similar to the one that the Malaysians built in its capital in Kuala Lumpur. The SMART System doubles as a river in times of flooding or strong rain and it has been proven to work in KL… but of course at a huge infrastructure cost! They are already acting fast on this as they want to start work right away so it can be finished during the term of Pres. Noynoy Aquino.

If the oppositors of the flyovers here in Cebu succeed in having the two flyovers cancelled, I guarantee you that the DPWH would thank their lucky stars that they can now divert funds for this humongous infra project. But the problem with our oppositors, they want to stop the project without any clear-cut timetables or doable alternatives.

As I pointed out before, road widening will not work simply because we have inefficient traffic managers who cannot see fit to apprehend illegal parking on the roads that we already widened more than 10 years ago. It is for this reason why many of our roads that are already wide are still clogged with traffic! Surely by now this has gotten into the big fat heads of those seeking to stop the flyovers. Here we are fighting over crumbs while Manila gets the big cheese! Shouldn’t we ask Manila for the cheese too?

With the DPWH making those plans for EDSA, this should not stop us Cebuanos from asking… or demanding that perhaps Cebu City ought to have a similar elevated highway plan that would start from the Cebu Country Club all the way to Pit-os in Talamban… or how about one from CICC all the way to the Fernan Bridge? These are among the most clogged thoroughfares here in Cebu and Mandaue. But then again we ought to ask whether Cebu is a priority in the Aquino administration?

Incidentally, three years ago, our infra committee in the Regional Development Council Region 7 (RDC-7) proposed that project which would link the Island of Cebu to the Island of Bohol. Maybe it’s the right time to present this project to Pres. PNoy so that we can easily cross to Bohol where there is less traffic. I’m sure it would still be a cheaper project than the one they are proposing for EDSA.

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Another bank bites the dust! Yes, unwary depositors of the LBC Development Bank owned by the Araneta Family, whose main office is along the corner of Gorordo Ave. and Arch. Reyes Ave., were caught unaware that their bank was ordered by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to stop operations and was placed under receivership. So now, depositors would have to go to the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. (PDIC) to get their money back. Shades of Legacy Bank of Celso delos Angeles and the Rural Bank of Subangdaku (RBS) and Orient Bank, now we add LBC Bank into this list.

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