BULL'S HIT

Rudy Garcia
Fires and illegal activities in Baguio

Just as we are starting to celebrate fire prevention month this March, a fire with unknown origin razed a large portion of the Baguio public market with the vegetable, rice and fruit sections most affected.

Sounds funny, but how could we now celebrate fire prevention seeing our brothers and sisters trying to save goods they can from the rubble? I feel pity for these victims who lost their sources of livelihood and worst their investments whom I was informed were borrowed at five-six percent interest while others were on a consignment basis but all gone to dust.

Though the cause was not yet determined, I don’t see any reason why we have to celebrate fire prevention at this time since the fire was not prevented. I am not saying the fire could be an accident or due to arson but it makes me wonder why this could happen when the market is just a distance away from the city fire department, and a few meters away from a city police precinct.

Besides, I presume there were security guards to watch that area. Why the fire happened at nighttime when there was no traffic is a puzzle, unless there could be some reason why it took so long for our firemen to arrive at the area longer than we expected.

And just as those affected are thinking what the future holds in store for them, another fire broke out at a hotel near Imelda Park, afternoon of March 5. I was a little displeased with that lady personnel at the fire department who got the nerve to give a stupid reason why the series of fire incidents happened in this city.

Imagine her saying “Summer kasi kaya uso ang sunog!” Whew! Attention Insp. Juanito Palaroan, of the city fire department. Do you think we can easily buy this flimsy excuse coming from one of your staff? No sir, hindi po kami ganun katanga. Fire prevention? Baka fire creation!
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A Baguio City counsilor questioned barangay captain Michael Flores of Kabayanihan Barangay if the latter knew the city ordinance prohibiting sidewalks for any trading or business purposes during a council session held at the session hall of Baguio City Hall.

This was seemingly an insult to the intelligence of this bocap who was only trying to ask permission from the city council for the temporary use of assumption road and its sidewalk for its barangay fund raising trade fair in commemoration of their barangay fiesta.

This Lady councilor also made a comment on why this bocap seemed to forgotten that roads and sidewalks are public places which are beyond the commerce of man. I would have given some round of applause to the councilor if not for the idea that she was trying to single out this barangay captain.

What about the Panagbenga Flower Festival at Session Road wherein both roads and sidewalks are now are now occupied? Where is the law that should have been applied here? And if reports are true that this lady councilor owns the adjacent stalls along Bonifacio St. that encroach the sidewalks, then she should look at herself in the mirror and see if she is really clean and green!
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We really have not learned our lessons from past experiences when we had to shout and nag at drivers of vehicles we follow because of slow traffic particularly during times when we have lot of visitors coming to this summer capita.

In fact, I even dared ask city officials if we were ready to face the traffic problem with the onset of Panagbenga. Look, it seems they were not prepared when the actual peak of the celebration came. The traffic remains the same and even became worse.

I could see those inexperienced rookie young traffic policemen doing their rounds of directing the traffic lacking in coordination and systems method. Some were even seen busy texting and playing with their cellphones while traffic caused bottlenecks. Anyway, we have plenty of traffic experts who are telling us they are always ready to face the problem of traffic once it will be there. He! He! They have done a good job indeed!
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We could still see a lot of vehicles emitting killer usok and it’s a wonder why these were given certificates of compliance with the Clean Air Act from accredited smoke emission testing centers. If these centers and the Land Transportation Office were telling us the truth that they were doing their job, then we might as well urge them to test their testing equipments, and if their equipments are doing fine, then I guess something is wrong somewhere. I think we have to test all those people at the LTO and these accredited testing centers. Come on why don’t we start fixing those fixers! Umpisahan na!
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If reports of rampant illegal pocket mining at Camp 6 Tuba Benguet were true, this was confirmed by the joint surveillance operation conducted by operatives of the regional Criminal Investigation and Detective Group.

The operation led to the discovery of illegal pine tree cutting at a far away mountain, two hours if we travel on foot from the toll booth along the highway. On the other side was quarrying activity of the mountain rock aggregates and it’s a disgust to see how the mountain was slowly eroding down to the small river.

The Department of Natural and Environmental Resources, BUreau of Forestry, municipal , and barangay officials have a lot of explaining to do. I will be reserving the space of this column to let the public the complete details of this expose in the next issue of this paper. Abangan ang malaking pagbubulgar!.