Illegal firecracker manufacturers are smarter

By Leonardo Micua

BEFORE the new year, policemen in Dagupan and Pangasinan started to crack the whip on the selling of unlabeled firecrackers and pyrotechnics. But their best was simply not enough as the unlabeled firecrackers, especially the banned commodities, slipped past their guard and vendors still managed to sell them discretely.

As we earlier reported, there was only one factory in Dagupan issued a license by the PNP at Camp Crame to manufacture firecrackers. This is the one located in Barangay Bacayao Norte. One of the conditions set in that license is that the product must be properly labeled, stating the address and name of the manufacturer and the number of the permit.

 But many illegal manufacturers already started producing and distributing their banned items before the yuletide season started.

We are not saying that the policemen were remiss in their duties to make sure that only the labelled and authorized firecrackers were sold by vendors because the policemen stayed with the vendors till they packed up their wares to call it a day.

The illegal manufacturers were simply smarter. They managed to pass on their products to their customers without being detected by the police by texting their customers where to pick up their products.  Others safely peddled their illegal pyrotechnics from their homes, knowing that the cops cannot just enter their abodes without a search warrant.

We noted seven firecracker injuries in Dagupan City alone in the early hours of January, and we suspect that the firecrackers that misfired came from underground factories.

If the use of firecracker is not already totally banned next year, the police and the bureau of  fire protection must take extra effort in looking for these illegal firecracker factories at least months before the yuletide season.

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Endless lies about Mayor Belen Fernandez are being dished out daily by a self-styled independent radio commentator being aired on a block time program of an FM station sponsored by a company owned by the family of the candidate now challenging the mayor.

This program, which I understand had been on for years has only one objective in mind: to make the administration of Mayor Belen look ugly to make up for the zero accomplishment of the boy boss.

Take note of the disclaimer at the beginning of the radio program: It is disowning any part of the derogatory if not slanderous statements to be made by the host. (What the station does not seem to be aware of is that a slanderous statement whether aired during block time or not is equally liable because it has the right to reject the program and the talent).

The constant black propaganda only validates the suspicion that the boy boss is aware of his serious political handicap as a non-performing public servant for many years which explains the need for his camp to feed lies about the mayor to boost his stock.

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The flood and landslide spawned by Typhoon Usman already caused hundreds of deaths and the destruction of billions of pesos of infrastructure in the Bicol region was the result of climate change exacerbated by man’s wanton disregard of the environment.

But the Bicolanos are not blaming any of their officials but accepted the reality that the deaths were caused by unprecedented volume of rain, a phenomenon which only God could have prevented.

 Thank God, Usman spared Dagupan otherwise the bashers will again go to town and blame the mayor endlessly for the flooding in spite of what environmental experts say that in this era of climate change, backfilling of our residential communities as well as raising the floor levels of business establishments are solutions that can abate climate change.

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