The Aboitiz Group's role in Cebu's development

I was supposed to attend last Tuesday's "Aboitiz Foundation's (AF) Interventions in Education" that celebrated its 25th Year at the Cebu International Convention Center (CICC), but having my senior moments, I instead went to the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation, Inc. (RAFI) and found myself in a MEGA Cebu dialogue with MEGA Cebu officials led by our dear friend Sir Bobby Aboitiz who was introducing to our congressmen, notably Rep. Raul del Mar and Rep. Ace Durano, what MEGA Cebu is all about. Since I haven't seen Sir Bobby for a long time, I decided to stay in RAFI.

There were a few things that we learned in that talk… that for instance, MEGA Cebu would have been Cebu's equivalent to Metro Manila's Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA). Rep. Raul del Mar told the group that I have been advocating the creation of Cebu's version of MMDA for the past 20 years now, but what prevented this progress was ugly politics.

I have already written it here many times before that the Cebu Development Authority (CDA) that would have been authored by Rep. Raul del Mar could not take flight for the reason that…who among the political giants in Cebu would head the CDA? Or to put it bluntly, which of the leaders of the feuding Osmeña camps would head this body? Since no one would budge an inch, the better part of valor was to scrap the CDA.

There is a truism that when our political overlords fight amongst themselves,  it is the Cebuano people that gets victimized. Just imagine the CDA would have celebrated its 20 years if only the Osmeñas didn't quarrel amongst themselves. This is why I have always batted for a constitutional change so we can put term limits on politicians and prevent political dynasties from getting a stranglehold of a public office as if it were a family heirloom that could be passed on from generation to generation.

Today, we now have MEGA Cebu in place and thanks to RAFI that acts as its secretariat, MEGA Cebu has been introduced to the Cebuano people down to the grassroots level. Its aim is not to duplicate the current bureaucracy in the national government, but to streamline the services of the local government units (LGUs) to make things move faster for the greater benefit of Cebu. That meeting with Sir Bobby Aboitiz was to convince our congressmen to "buy-in" to the concept of MEGA Cebu. Of course our congressmen were very polite and impressed that MEGA Cebu has already moved forward. They showed their eagerness to attend meetings.

Meanwhile, I'd like to say that MEGA Cebu must now take the cudgels and demand from the national government why its list of infrastructure projects approved by the Regional Development Council (RDC-7) and the DPWH Regional Office-7 were literally disapproved by the DPWH Manila office. It makes me sick that we in Cebu are already starved for infrastructure projects under Pres. Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III and yet, a vital infra project that we needed 10 years ago was shut down just like that!

Meanwhile, I'd like to point to our friends in MEGA Cebu that finally DPWH is putting a sidewalk along that short stretch of road in Salinas Drive from the AsiaTown IT Park to Gov. Cuenco Ave. by the flyover. My question is, how come that sidewalk is still too narrow? I know that there is a minimum width allowed by the National Building Code (NBC) which in my book is outdated as it was enacted into law when the Philippines only had 14 million people. They should widen it some more while they are still doing it!!

Meanwhile just across that new sidewalk construction is the TESDA Regional office, which has a huge wall without any provisions for a sidewalk. I dare say that MEGA Cebu officials should make representations with TESDA and DPWH to destroy their wall and make way for a sidewalk. This is what people expect MEGA Cebu to be doing… so let's start now.

Finally, on that meeting that I missed with the Aboitiz Foundation at the Cebu International Convention Center (CICC), we learned that AF President Jon Ramon Aboitiz announced that instead of just helping the Department of Education (DepEd) rebuild or build schools, it would now focus on building science and technical and vocational schools.

Yes, I would like to believe that this shift in focus is the step in the right direction. Not all jobs available to our people are white collar jobs. In fact, the majority of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) are skilled workers. In Canada, for instance, the highest paid skilled workers are specialized welders who work in extreme temperatures near the Arctic Circle and yes, you will find Filipinos working in those extreme environments. At this point, we should thank the Aboitiz Foundation and RAFI for their great work in the development of the nation, especially here in Cebu without whose help, Cebu would never have grown the way it has grown.

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