Think about it
A French Riviera in Brgy. Pantal
By Jun Velasco
“Courage consists not in hazarding without fear, but being resolutely minded in a just cause,” Plutarch
LOOKS like there’s yet no end to our tumultuous days.
The Senate’s first day of “inquisition” of Janet Lim-Napoles turned out to be a circus for tele viewers who want blood on the not-so-mediocre milking cow of our poor Filipino people due to vultures like her and her legislator-sponsors.
Good thing there’s our friend and favorite Senator Miriam D. Santiago providing comic relief with her un-courtly histrionics which have failed to pin down the well coached Ms. Napoles.
Btw, this columnist used to fetch in a taxi then UP Collegian editor Miriam Defensor in the 60’s from UP Diliman to the residence of Badong Bernal (yes, the late National Artist) at #73 St. Mary’s Street in Cubao for our Vox leadership training program.
Any lawyer worth his/her salt will tell you that Napoles’ legal strategy which was to elude and conceal the truth could cost her life eventually.
Not only in the court of law—but in God’s law.
Miriam was too transparent in her effort to pin down her pet peeve, Senator Johnny Enrile, et al, but Ms. Napoles was devotedly faithful to her legal strategists.
As of this writing, there’s no telling when the circus would last. Incidentally, the other event hogging the news headline, is what Jessica Soho called the “strongest storm” Yolanda that hit the country Friday.
All this, of course, is meant to shake the unbelievers from their seat of conscience, what with millions of our hapless countrymen grappling with the basic necessities of life, some of them forced to seek shelter in damaged tombs of a cemetery in earthquake-devastated Bohol.
While we wrote this, Ptr. Willie Cariño texted this reminder from the Lord, in Psalm 27:5 “For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock.”
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When our cumpadre writer Armando Ravanzo was still alive, we’d sit on a stone beside the Pantal River to divine the stars in the deep of night.
The river wasn’t as polluted then and so inspired many poems from Mando’s pen.
After the hotly fought barangay polls, a new leader has risen in Barangay Pantal, Ms. Julie Ann Fernandez-Perez.
Her triumph was like a whiff of fresh wind that revived the poetry on Pantal River.
Friends, especially the futuristic, still sing of the river as a potential French Riviera, especially now with Julie’s election, who is a confidante of Mayor Belen Fernandez and Rep. Gina de Venecia.
We told our architech-friend Gil Estrada and Pantal apartment owner Pete de Vera that the three-some of Gina, Belen and Julie would make a modern Tres Marias for a classic Pantal Revival that would convert the unkempt barangay into a center of beauty in this River City of Dagupan, alleged Bangus Queen of the world.
We saw last Thursday at the invitation of our cumpadre Alex de Leon the spirit of dynamism that catapulted Julie Ann to the totem pole of barangay leadership at the Perez’s residence; it was full of people being treated by a medical team headed by Dr. Leonardo Carbonell. The scene showed that the family and the new barangay leaders haven’t lost their energy in the name of service.
Let’s not forget, too, that Julie Ann’s predecessor, Lilia Yasar, did a good start in the ongoing embankment project that would shield the barangay from a swollen Pantal River.
We suggest Julie should distill the counsel of barangay mates on what makes an ideal barangay and draw up with the two Marias and her kin, former Mayor Al Fernandez a model for what is envisaged as Dagupan’s new tourist attraction.
Well, yes, it could cost a fortune, but with well-meaning leaders like JdV, Al F and others it won’t be a wild idea.
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The last poll, observers say, was not as extravagant because massive spending was decapitated by the Napoles scandal.
We think these post Napoles days would augur for a less corrupt government.
Which would be pleasing to the Lord.
Like what we wrote here in our last week’s column; in spite of its imperfections, a democratic government is still better than most forms of government.
We wish to congratulate our re-elected Kapitan Rico Mejia of barangay Bonuan Gueset and newly elected Kapitan of our birthplace, Barangay Malued Filipina delos Santos!
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Before he left for the U.S., orig pal Voltaire Arzadon, Colegio de Dagupan president, made a bulls eye observation that corruption has flourished because of an uneducated public.
He must be referring to the formation and cultivation of values.
For how explain many of our “highly educated” leaders graduating as wrong models to our people?
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NOTES: Birthday greetings to now 64-year young Sta. Maria Mayor Teddy Ramos on Nov. 9!…. Wedding Anniversary greetings to Phil and Julie Perez on Nov. 8!….. Congrats, to admin Ramil Gutierrez for his induction as president of the Pangasinan Coast Lions Club recently.
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