Playing with Fire
Spines’ righteous wrath
By Gonzalo Duque
IN the aftermath of the deadliest and most destructive Typhoon Pepeng that flattened and inundated our province, we wish to remind public officials and the high heeled private socialites hereabouts to please (por Dios por santo) forego their frivolous and extravagant activities.
If before you were at liberty to indulge in pompous and bacchalian activities, that abuse is not allowed now. The country lies prostrate with all the devastations it got from the great flood – reminding us of Noah’s Deluge.
We consider it not only in bad taste but a crime to see our countrymen behaving like Nero who was playing the harp while Rome was burning.
It’s time to review and reevaluate our priorities and values in life if they are still relevant to the times. There are still many among us who are insensitive and callous to the pains and anguish that have downed our people. It’s time we reminded them about the virtue of humility or else, we, too, would be guilty of tolerance and irrelevance.
We suggest a year-long disaster preparedness planning activities not only among government people – but among all sectors.
* * *
We received a lot of text messages commending our comment about the ugly eyesores of fish pens in Dagupan City as an evidence of greed and lack of a sense of beauty by Dagupeños.
They said that the major cause of the great flood could be the San Roque Dam’s uncalled-for release of excess water, but the fish pens and the several blockades that hamper the free flow of water have made the situation worse.
Why is the city administration deaf and blind to these abuses of our rivers? What? Livelihood? May we invite your attention to the ugliness of it all? Go to that side where Pantal and Lucao meet at the De Venecia Diversion Road, and you see very ugly clusters of bamboo sticks jutting out of the river that hurt your eyes.
A componidor of a fishpond in Sitio Took told us that they suffered from fishkill a couple of months back before the two deadly typhoons hit us.
We hope the disaster will have taught our fish pen owners some lessons in life. They can’t escape the wrath of nature.
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We were among those who applauded Governor Spines when he gave Napocor and San Roque officials a dose of their own medicine. It became very clear that the dam managers were very reckless and irresponsible in their indiscriminate release of excess water from the dams that did great havoc and damage to our province.
There are those who dislike Spines’ outburst whenever he sees something wrong. But to us, those were his finest moments because we need to be angry at people who destroy our national patrimony. What would you prefer, a leader who keeps on smiling even in the face of environmental damage or one who raises hell and pounds the table with his clenched fist because he is angry at those who do not protect the lives of the people?
Your answer is as good as ours. Ok ka Spines.
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