The South Coastal Road

Before anything else, please allow me to express our great joy. My lady Carmen and I are glad to have seen our youngest child, Charisse, walk the graduation march yesterday morning. Our happiness multiplied when, hours later, our daughter in law, Aimee, also completed her second degree.

 Now, to my column.

 I had another chance to cruise along the south coastal road, the other day. It has been sometime ago since I traveled on this avenue that is why I used the words “another chance”. Upon embarking on that trip, I expected to see signs of progress what with the numerous glowing newspaper and tv plugs advertising a company’s construction of this and that project. Nothing of that sort came. As soon as I hit the stilted (for the lack of a more appropriate technical term) portion not far from the city hall, I had a weird, because inexplicable, feeling.

 Until today and as far as I know, this road has no official name attached to it yet. To think that this was completed quite a number of years ago already, it is still called by the generic name – south coastal road. Considering the propensity of our political demigods to place their names to just about everything visible to the voters’ eyes, it is rather unbelievable that no politician has yet thought about passing a law on how to call this infrastructure.

 There may be a load of good reasons why it is just called simply as the south coastal road. Perhaps, our politicians could not agree among themselves whose name should be inscribed on its side and at every corner it has or may have. Well, to be honest, I was tempted to use the word hung, instead of inscribe, until ethics more than decency, prevailed.

 This road was opened to public use during the administration of former Pres. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. She could have directed that it be named after her father were it not, probably, for the stigma attached to an atrociously priced road near the coast of Pasay City in Metro Manila. The construction cost of that road would top Ripley’s records of ignominy.

 I like to believe that former Sen. John H. Osmeña, helped secure the appropriation for this road. Many may curse me for saying this but if my memory serves me right, the then senator, while walking along the corridors of power, threw his weight to ensure the adequacy of funds for the realization of this highway. And he did that despite his perceived animosity with his own cousin, the then mayor of our city. With that kind of a clout, he, too, could have conditioned the release of people’s money for any name of his choice. He, obviously, did not.

 His Honor, Congressman Tomas R. Osmeña, of Cebu City south district, was our mayor when the south coastal road was completed. That might have led him to think that he had dominion over it for which reason, there was occasion that he ordered it be used only for certain vehicles and closed for others. At a later time though, his directive was put to the trash by a legitimate court order. He could have also entertained naming the road after someone close to him. In fairness to him, he also preferred not to.

 The entire stretch of the road covers the coast of the south congressional district of this city. For more than 20 years, the family of Rep. Antonio Cuenco reigned there. He could have likewise been titillated to putting his family name as the road marker, although, he might have suppressed that idea because of his unconcealed desire to play sycophant to the mayor.

 It is not easily understandable that this road remains unnamed. If it be the intention of our leaders to keep it detached from any political color, let there be a law calling this as such Cebu South Coastal Road. Rep. Osmeña can file that bill now and make sure that further funding be made available to make this road approximate international standards of strength and aesthetics.

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