By Leonardo Micua

 

DESPITE the 49 degrees heat index on April 30, the Bangusan Street Party on Jose de Venecia Expressway Extension was another big hit. An estimated more than 500,000 people from all walks of life jostled their way to the venue to take part in this once a year spectacle.

The grilling of 22,000 pieces of bangus over 1,200 connected steel grills was only the curtain raiser to the street party. The feast that followed among friends, co-workers and families was just the appetizer.

The main event was the performance of top music bands from Manila who performed in six different stages. I was informed that the BINI pop group had to cut short its performance on seeing some of their fans were beginning to faint because of excessive heat and needed medical attention.

So electrified were the music lovers that they stayed on till the wee hours in the morning.

According to my source, by 9:00 p.m. it was already pretty difficult for anyone to navigate their way from CSI parking area to JdV Expressway because of the volume of people standing.

“It was the biggest Bangusan Street Party ever,” proclaimed Mayor Belen Fernandez in her Facebook account. After all, more or less one million people even from afar came to watch and participate.

With DOT Undersecretary Ferdinand Jumamao and DOT Regional Director Jeff Ortega spotted among the crowd huddling with Congressman Toff,  the Bangusan Street Party will surely be etched in the country’s tourism calendar of festivals, if it isn’t already.

Give the credit where it is due. With her leadership style and imagination, Mayor Belen made the Bangusan Street Party as one of the biggest and most attended street parties in the entire Philippines today. Known for her hands-on management style, Belen saw to it that all approved plans must be executed up to its minute detail.

She again succeeded where his predecessors had failed.

Of course, her vocal critics in the Dagupan Sangguniang Panlungsod shied away from the Bangusan Street Party and are not happy over the success of the event. I was informed that they had their one small kalutan too with their few friends and allies in a bid to steal the limelight away from Belen. They did not succeed.

They had always insisted that the “kalutan” street party should be done on A.B. Fernandez Avenue where it really started in 2002 to preserve the legacy of the late Mayor  Benjie Lim, the founder of the Bangus Festival.

Time and again, Belen told the opposition that because the Bangusan Street Party has grown into a full-blown event attended even by a million of spectators, a bigger venue would be needed to ensure everyone’s safety.

Recall that it was not Belen who decided to transfer the venue to JdV Expressway the first time. It’s the Mayor Al Fernandez-Belen Fernandez tandem that made the Bangusan Street Party known nationwide and even worldwide.

The opposition in the SP, among them the mother and daughter of the founder of the Bangus Festival, could not accept the fact that A. B. Fernandez Avenue as a venue already lost its magic (no pun intended) as venue for the Bangusan Street Party.

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The shocking statement of no less than United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres that the era of global warming has ended and the era of global boiling has just begun is actually another call to all nations, especially the rich ones, to adopt extra-ordinary measures to help slow down climate change or else the world we live in will soon be gone. 

It’s the climate change which is the real culprit on why we are experiencing a heat wave in the Philippines, especially in Dagupan where highest heat index is being experienced.

But the heat wave is not only confined to the Philippines but in the whole of Southeast Asia, affecting all countries near the earth’s equator, directly exposed to the sun at this time of the year.

It is the climate change that turned roads into rivers in the desert kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and in Dubai in the United Arabia Emirate when they were hit by torrential rains. 

U.N. Secretary General Guterres also called on fossil fuel companies to reduce their carbon emission to the barest minimum to further extend the lifespan of the ozone layer, the roof of the world, that is protecting humans from the killing effect of the ultra-violet rays of the sun. 

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