Promises, Promises

“It will be done.”

These were the intense concluding words of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in her State of the Nation Address after mentioning that House Speaker Jose de Venecia, Jr. and Alaminos City Mayor Hernani Braganza have requested her to build an airport in the hometown of the world-famous Hundred Islands National Park.

She mentioned the Alaminos airport after making a long inventory of all the other ongoing and planned airport construction and rehabilitation projects around the country.

Now, if you watched her body language carefully and listened to her delivery attentively, it would have been pretty obvious that the President herself was not absolutely convinced of her own words.

Truth of the matter is, the Alaminos International Airport is nowhere found in the original text of her SONA.

It was an impromptu pronouncement, most likely prompted by backdoor chitchat just minutes before she stepped inside the main session hall of the House of Congress to deliver her annual report to the people.

Given that, De Venecia, Braganza, and the rest of us should not be surprised if we don’t find any immediate allocation in the government’s budget for the construction of this supposedly long-dreamed of airport.

It may be acknowledged a longstanding dream for us, but if the national government does not really have that airport in its priority list, then we can kiss that dream goodbye. For without the national government’s support, our local government would be very, very hard-pressed to construct any type of airport, (certainly not an international one!) if at all possible.

So let’s save ourselves the pain of disappointment. Take that announcement with a grain of salt.

Given her track record on promises, there isn’t likely going to be an airport around these parts by the time the President steps down – as she clearly promised as well in her SONA -in 2010.

Let’s hope that, at the very least, the next president will fulfill that dream for Pangasinan.

Share your Comments or Reactions

comments

Powered by Facebook Comments