What's happening to our town, Ronda?

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA — Today, the fifteenth of September is the town fiesta of our beloved town, Ronda, a fourth-class municipality some 81 kilometers southwest in the Cebu peninsular province. Ronda is bound by the prosperous towns of Dumanjug and Barili to the north, the towns of Alcantara and Moalboal to the south, the mountains of Argao and Sibonga to the east and the Tañon Strait and Negros Oriental to the west. It is the town of the Blancos, the Vilagonzalos, the Maribaos, the Gimenas, the Villalons, the Gimarinos, the Famors, and the Remotigues. This is the small town which was also the birthplace of the late Cebu governor Francisco Emilio Famor Remotigue, who was later appointed by President Ferdinand Marcos as the first Secretary of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, then called SWA or Social Welfare Administration. Ronda is the home of many lawyers, marine officers, engineers, nurses, doctors, pharmacists, educators, and priests.

This year is a very sad occasion because our town mayor, Mariano Yap Blanco III, was executed a few days before our fiesta by unknown assailants in an unsolved brazen murder right inside the town hall at the wee hours of the dawn. Blanco was one of the two town mayors whom President Rodrigo Duterte tagged as being allegedly linked to drugs. The Blancos and many Rondahanons considered such a pronouncement quite unfair because our mayor has never been formally charged of any such crime, much less is there any palpable evidence linking him to drugs. The Blancos have been in political control of the town for the last 30 years and his brother Mariano Y. Blanco V, fondly called Terence, is slated to run next year for mayor.

Terence Blanco, my compadre, will most probably be opposed by a young Law graduate and wife of a regional trial judge, Sinia Taypin, who is a daughter of a former mayor and judge. Incidentally, Sinia and her husband, the judge, were my students at the University of the East College of Law. The murder of Mayor Blanco was treacherously done seven months after our vice mayor, Atty. Jonnah John Blanco Ungab, was likewise murdered by unknown criminals right in the vicinity of the Cebu Palace of Justice. Until now, both murders are unsolved. Thus, our whole town is grieving just as our patroness, Our Lady of Sorrows, is in perennial grief. Rondahanons who are all over the world join those who remain in our town in these days of great bereavement.

Many Rondahanons here in Las Vegas, as well as those in New York and in California are asking me what is happening to our town. Well, I am an absentee son of Ronda. I have been residing in Metro Manila for the past 30 years or so, just like the Ronda folks in the USA, Europe, Middle East, and the seafarers in the world's seven seas. Our town needs a long-term vision and a leadership that shall involve the grassroots and would allow more participation from the people, especially the youth. I love the Blanco family and I am even related to them by blood and affinity. The matriarch, Mama Sally, is like a second mother to me, and late patriarch was my SWU teacher and PMT commandant in the ‘60s. Both Terence and Sinia can offer new hopes for our town. Whoever will win next year should present new hopes for development for the people of Ronda.

Ronda has a lot of opportunities for development. There are many millennials from our town who can contribute and open new windows for progress and positive change. We just have to give them the chance and equal opportunity to help.