Grisly mishap caps holidays

Tuesday, while driving through the Bacolod Circumferential Road to Bata Subdivision, I exchanged perceptions with Tony and Ellen Yap about the dangers to motorists posed by heavily-loaded cane trucks.

Shortly after reaching the Our Lady of Lourdes Parish convent, CPA Willy Gonzales arrived and informed me about the bedlam at the Riverside Medical Center’s emergency room with more than a dozen mishap victims rushed by various ambulances for emergency treatment.

It was precisely the kind of danger along Negros Occidental’s road which the Yap couple and I had been discussing earlier. The toll, however, was high, Five killed and 14 injured when a heavily loaded trailer of a 10-wheeler prime mover slammed into a passenger jeepney on the road leading to the Victorias Milling Company in Victorias City 5 p.m. Tuesday.

Some of the victims were buried under tons of sugarcane which were being brought by the truck to the VMC.

PNP provincial Supt. Initially identified the fatalities as Regino Montejar, 59, a science teacher of the Victorias National High School, Leah Escabilla, 13-year old Gigi Godayawan, and unidentified women.

Some of the victims had to be retrieved by rescuers from beneath piles of harvested sugarcanes which was dumped on them when the trailer heeled over and burled them under some 20 tons of millable canes.

That incident climaxed a bloody prolonged holiday that started November 1. The holiday, however, was interrupted on November 4 when the order declaring it a sandwiched holiday for Negros from Malacanang arrived later.

November 4, sandwiched by the Cinco de Noviembre celebration of the Negros Revolution against the Spaniards.

Still, despite the broadcast announcement that government offices were opening again, many employees failed to reach their offices because of the paralyzing transport strike led by the United Negros Drivers and Operators Center (UNDOC).

I made the rounds of Bacolod City that day. And there was hardly any public utility vehicles plying the streets. The roads were empty except for a sprinkling of privately-owned vehicles.

The strike was called by UNDOC secretary general Jessie Ortega to call for the scrapping of the Oil Deregulation Law. But the protesters also included a demand for the government to raise ages and salaries of workers and to stop the increased cost of basic commodities.

Even Vallacar Transit, Inc., operator of Ceres busliners, joined the transport boycott.

The public transport drivers also aired an appeal for increase in fare rates, pointing out that the latest round of fuel hikes had made it more difficult for drivers to make both ends meet.

There was also another bloody incident. The massacre of his father-in-law, and two year old grandson by Rodrigo alias Jerry Monterey of Purok Pag-asa, of Barangay Ma-ao, Bago City last Monday.

Monterey, reported to have suffered from a nervous breakdown, was also killed later by responding policemen when he allegedly tried to attack a Bago cop.

Five others were wounded by Monterey who wielded a six-inch knife in his bloody orgy.

The victims included Crisanto and Jona Flordeliz, the couple’s one-year old son, Josua, Rodolfo, a brother of Monterey, also landed in the hospital with knife-wounds.

But that was not a pat incident. Supt. Ponteras asked the Criminal and Investigation Detection Group to handle the probe into the massacre incident, including an investigation of a Bago policeman who killed the suspect.

A responding policeman, SPO3 Arnaldo Barrientos, was also wounded by Monterey.

To eliminate rumors, Ponteras asked CIDC to handle the Investigation, especially the gunplay. That included an inquiry into complaints from barangay residents of delayed response by the members of the Bago police sub-station which was just 200 meters away from the bloody scene.

Freak flood

There was another astonishing phenomenon. The Sunday flooding of the VMC Canetown when the Malihao River of Victorias City overflowed its banks post a heavy four-hour downpour.

The rise of floodwaters prompted the mill to sound its siren to warn Canetown residents and those of the mill compound sending residents bundling up their personal possessions to prevent heavy damage by the flood waters.

The VMC community has been flooded 22 times already. In November, 1995, the water level rose 15 feet. There was another memorable flash flood on Jan. 15, 2001 when flood waters reached eight feet high.

However, the Sunday event did not do much damage as earlier feared by mill officials and the residents of Canetown.

The Bloodless Revolution

Historical records show that there was only a handful of casualties when the Negros revolutionaries rose up against the Spanish forces on Nov. 5, 1898.

That event preceded EDSA by several decades and it ended with the Spaniards capitulating to the Northern and Southern armies headed by Generals Aniceto Lacson and Juan Araneta.

Actually, it was won through a grand deception that struck terror among the outnumbered Spanish defenders of Bacolod.

Talisay City held a separate commemorative event of Cinco de Noviembre from the more colorful and dramatic Bago City celebration.

The Bago celebration included parading "sawali" canons that belched fire and thundered shots. These improvised cannons were replicas of the one trundled into Bacolod by the southern forces of Gen. Araneta.

According to the history books, a sentry atop the belfry of the San Sebastian Cathedral alerted Spanish authorities about the approach of a big force from the South to join the Northern Army of Gen. Lacson.

The marching troops were pushing and were equipped with glistening brand-new Murata rifles with bayonets.

Confronted by the formidable Filipino forces, the Spanish authorities later capitulated.

It was only when they had laid down their arms that the Spanish soldiers discovered they’ve been had. The brand new rifles that struck terror among them were actually coconut palms crafted to look like rifles and painted well they glistened when brought on the shoulders of the Filipino soldiers. The cannons were actually rolled sawali mounted on carabao carts and painted meticulously they escaped detection as non-lethal weapons.

There is reason to celebrate an event where Filipino ingenuity succeeded in winning a victory with hardly a bloodshed. EDSA Uno and Dos had their predecessors in the bloodless revolution of Negros.

There have been attempts by some historians to undercut Cinco de Noviembre which has been billed by some critics as a revolt of the Negros elite. But there’s no denying the fact that the Negrense revolutionaries managed to liberate Negros from the Spaniards.