Make ro-ro travel truly a ro-ro experience

Whenever it’s Holy Week, I usually stay at home for two reasons. First, because from Holy Thursday to Black Saturday, traffic in Metro Cebu is virtually nonexistent and it remind me of the ’50s, the ’60s and ’70s when traffic in Cebu gets snarled along Mango Ave. during the Novena Masses at the Redemptorist Church only on Wednesdays. The second reason is I’m less tolerant of ports or airports during the holiday rush where things get so chaotic, where you can really feel that our government agencies still don’t get it, that we the people or “The Boss” as what President Benigno “P-Noy” Aquino III would say are simply not treated as we should be.

But since my wife has to do some work for the Bellevue Resort in Panglao, she insisted that we go to Bohol. Since we would be there for four days, I brought my pickup to board the Lite Ferry barge from Mandaue Port to Tubigon. This is a roll-on, roll-off (ro-ro) vessel, which has sprouted since 2001 when the Anti-Carnapping Permits (ANCAR) was removed.

Removing the ANCAR permits allowed many ports all over the country to convert into ro-ro ports and it became the backbone program of then President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo dubbed Strong Republic Nautical Highway (SRNH), which helped develop domestic tourism and the economic development of many ports in Northern Mindanao and the Visayas.

But there is still so much bureaucracy that needs to be removed to make ro-ro travel truly a roll-on and roll-off experience. Right now, after presenting your bill of lading, you still need to pay the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) fee. Please don’t get me wrong. I’m not complaining about paying the P129 fee. However, things are moving forward at the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) on the aviation front, where, even at the Mactan Cebu International Airport Authority (MCIAA), the long lines for the terminal fee have all but disappeared because this fee is now incorporated in the airline ticket.

So my question is, what is keeping the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) from following the example of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) or MCIAA? If and when the PPA undo this bureaucratic blockage, only then can we truly say that ro-ro travel in this country is truly a roll-on and roll-off experience. I hope that under the leadership of P-Noy, he would push to make this thing happen for the Visayas and Mindanao.

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If there was anything I sort of validated during my Holy Week visit to Bohol, it is that the further you get away from the cities, you will notice that the people are closer to their church and the Catholic faith. Last Thursday as we arrived in Tubigon, we passed by the town of Calape and heard the Holy Mass there. This Gothic styled church was jam-packed to the brim, I would like to believe that the entire town went to church.

After mass, on our way to Panglao, we passed by the church of the town of Loon and traffic was snarled because their mass had just been concluded and people were leaving the church grounds. On Good Friday, we went to the Dauis Church and the San Augustine Church in Panglao and the faithful were all there for church services. So is it only happening in Bohol where people still attend church activities or is it happening all over the country?

Since I was in Panglao, I decided to visit the Bohol Beach Club (BBC), the resort built by our dear friend Anos Fonacier, dubbed the “Father of Cebu’s Tourism development,” and that of Bohol’s tourist economic boom. I texted his son Boom if he was in Bohol, but it was then that I learned the BBC was closed for renovation because part of this resort was sold to the Alturas group from Bohol, who wanted to renovate this resort, which has Panglao’s best beaches.

I was told that there is a possibility that they might not reopen by September because a good number of their ex-employees have allied themselves with the National Union of Hotel and Restaurant Workers and Allied Industries (NUWHRAIN). If you didn’t know, this left-leaning worker’s union is considered the most unpredictable and unreasonable union in the country.

I understand that this union has grown bolder because of their association with Akbayan, yes, the same Akbayan that P-Noy has embraced. If NUWHRAIN gets the hotels and resorts of Bohol unionized, you can bet that there will be a lot of hotel closures that would happen in Bohol.

If I can boast to be part of Bohol’s tourism development, it is because during my stint as chairman of the Regional Development Council Region 7 (RDC-7), we held a public hearing in Tagbilaran sometime in 1997. Back then it was the nuns in Tagbilaran who were opposed to the tourism plan because of the sex trade it could bring. We told the nuns that there would be more jobs for Bohol’s women when the tourists come and this has happened. I hope that their tourism growth won’t be spoiled by ugly unionism.

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