Welcome Arch. Jose Palma: Cebu's new shepherd

It came as a surprise last Saturday. The FREEMAN had the scoop on the announcement by the Apostolic Nuncio to the Philippines, Archbishop Edward Joseph Adams that Archbishop Jose Palma of Palo, Leyte has been designated as the new Archbishop of Cebu to replace the retired Cebu Prelate, his eminence Ricardo Cardinal Vidal. However, we all expected his replacement to be named very soon and finally it happened.

No doubt that this is a joyous news for us in Cebu. The Cebu Archdiocese is as old as the Philippines. What I heard from friends is that Archbishop Palma is a very good choice. Indeed, while he fills the huge shoes of Cardinal Vidal, there is a chance that by February, Arch. Palma himself might just get his red hat. Let’s hope and pray for that.

I also gathered that Arch. Palma is an environmentalist and a human rights advocate, especially because of the human rights abuses in Samar. However, as Archbishop of Cebu, he must look at the wider picture because in Cebu we have a host of problems that is not present in Palo. Above all, Arch. Palma must take on the role of a shepherd because this, for me, is the greatest role that Cardinal Vidal has given us Cebuanos. We have united as Catholics because of his leadership; therefore, we cannot expect anything less from his successor. So we welcome Arch. Palma with a warm embrace and pray to God that he will be a great shepherd for us Cebuanos.

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Some years back when Gov. Gwen F. Garcia declared an all-out war against Communism, she was chastised by the allied front organizations supporting the underground insurgency that blood would flow in the streets of Cebu because of her declaration. Nothing could be further from the truth. Not only didn’t we see any bloodshed in her all-out war against communism, her declaration virtually reduced the once-powerful insurgents into petty criminals who were caught by the police for extortion activities. Hence we have peace in Cebu.

Once again, Gov. Gwen has made another declaration of war, this time it is against illegal fishing. But while one would think that the war against the communists would have resulted in bloodshed, I’m very positive that this new declaration could cause some violence because those illegal fishers, especially those commercial fishing companies are well-entrenched, well-connected and often well-armed.

Why do I say this? Well, just a few short years ago when the Visayan Sea Squadron headed by environmentalist par excellence Atty. Antonio Oposa went on a drive against illegal and dynamite fishing, it resulted in the assassination of Jojo dela Victoria, whom I used to work with when I was consultant for the market in Cebu City. In short, I expect these people to fight back with what they’ve got. Gov. Gwen ought to beef up her security, given the experience we already had with the dastardly killing of Jojo dela Victoria.

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Why are the streets in downtown Cebu flooding once again? I can only say that we didn’t have a budget to clean up the esteros, creeks and rivers. However, with or without a budget, the reality is, the City of Cebu didn’t prepare for the rainy season, even if it came late. What was lacking here is the sense of anticipation on the part of the Engineering Department of the City of Cebu.

It is a given that all our rivers and esteros get clogged everyday due to the tons of garbage and refuse, many of them plastic bags which all end up in the lower part of the river or esteros, preventing the water from exiting out into the sea. If these were removed before the rains, then there would have been no flash floods that affected mostly the downtown part of Cebu City.

Perhaps our Engineering people should be told that because of climate changes, which has caused the melting of the ice caps in the north and south poles the melted ice turns to water vapor and brought by the winds to anywhere in the world which then falls back into the earth as rain. This is why we have record rainfalls in the past two years. Surely our engineers should have anticipated more rainfall than usual. But then even if they did anticipate it, what good can it do if no one worked to declog rivers and esteros? Let’s stop blaming God for the flash flood and blame those who failed to do their jobs.

You can say the same thing about our potholes. Any expert on roads can tell you how long asphalt would last. But why do we allow our roads to break down into moon craters? Again, it is the lack of anticipation. Someone ought to be fired for not doing the job we are paying him to do!

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