EDITORIAL - When to say welcome meaningfully

It is a good thing that the Cebu City Council has put on hold any further discussion on a plan by Mayor Michael Rama to construct welcome arches at the entrances to all 80 barangays in Cebu City.

There is absolutely no compelling need to construct those welcome arches. The money earmarked for the useless project will be better spent on other, more productive, meaningful, and beneficial endeavors.

A welcome arch does absolutely nothing. Granted that it says welcome. But that’s it. So what if it says welcome? No welcome is more cold than that being said by an inanimate object. A much warmer and more realistic welcome is the one given by the people of a particular barangay.

But let us ask Mayor Rama? How many barangays are realistically warm in extending welcome to outsiders, be they native Filipinos or foreigners? In fact, any police blotter will tell you that more and more barangays, especially the urban ones, are getting more hostile than welcoming.

If Mayor Rama truly wants to exhibit warmth and extend a heartfelt welcome to all, the first thing he should do is make sure his words and feelings match the reality on the ground by making each and every barangay safe to visit, or even just to pass through, in the first place.

Only when a person, local or foreigner, can walk through a barangay safely without being harmed or have any of his personal belongings taken forcibly away from him will any word of welcome be realistic and warm.

But for as long as the safety of a person is in jeopardy, whether from his fellow men or from any other thing attributable to man, such as uncovered potholes, uncollected garbage, stray dogs let loose on the streets, no words of welcome will be believable.

Mayor Rama should think of solving the city’s problems first and having reveries about welcome arches last. Only when he makes the city safe and warm can he truly say, with wide open arms — and even without welcome arches — welcome to my barangay, welcome to my Cebu City.