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BY JUN ESCALONA
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Sunday, January 22, 2017
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VERY recently we heard the honorable Vice Gove. Ed Denosta tell us about the move, actually a resolution, in the Provincial Board requesting Sen. Loren Legarda and Antique Lone District representative Paolo Javier to move for apportioning two congressional districts for Antique. We are proud of this move by our provincial legislators and whoever authored and sponsored it deserves some acclaim, if not outright then later in the next choice of leaders.
The Sangguniang Panlalawigan (SP) resolution, when favorably acted upon by both legislators, would have the Lower House or the Senate sponsor a bill that will answer the long-standing desire of Antiqueños for more representation in Congress, that has remained just a desire for decades past. It had also earned for the province the moniker the “Lonely District of Antique.”
What will happen to the long awaited proposal remains to be seen, but at least some have the wisdom and the heart to put it into motion. We are reminded of the saying that to the determined, the impossible merely takes a little longer to accomplish. So, the move had started in us a longer process of waiting and anticipation.
Longer since it is expected there will be some obstacles to overcome, even non-conformity with the idea in our home turf, particularly since it did not emanate from them. We have experienced some of this kind of obstructionism in the past. Some would even argue that we are “not yet capable” or not yet ready. That, by whatever criteria or standards, is outrageously obstructive. And yet, Christians as we are, we should not be condemning the doer, just the deed of obstructing the way of the common good.
We go by the idea that Antique had long been qualified of having two congressional districts, in terms of population and income, or geographical size. And two representatives in Congress are better than one, particularly when the lone representation cannot represent the real sentiment of the people. Don’t get us wrong here, for we mean the theoretical assumption that this is so.
Absolutely, we do not believe that one is better than two, since the framers of the Local Government Code deemed it wise to have two sets of members representing the northern and southern sentimentalities in the Provincial Board.
If the proposal gains ground and passes scrutiny of the Lower House and the Senate, then Antique will no longer be the “lonely district of Antique.” By then, the province may be on its way to a new horizon where its people shall be a people who may, as Evelio Javier put it, “dream and have the capacity to fulfill their dreams.”
We cannot blame anybody for this slow pace of progress in Antique; we can only blame our leaders’ lack of idealism of a dreamer like Evelio, the idealist. For to stop to dream, we also stop to grow, since dreaming is tantamount to planning for our future.
Let us start to “dream” and not just pretend to embrace the idealism of Evelio, the idealism that had caused his ultimate sacrifice. Let us start showing the works because without it, people consider it hypocrisy of the highest degree.
There is no need to die to be called an idealist, or we could run out of parks to name after them. One need only show idealism in deeds, showing their concern for the less privileged masses maybe, or by “building bridges not walls” and furthering what good had been started by the others.
Nobody has a monopoly of good deeds, but they are easily distinguishable from the not so good ones. Agree, or agreed?
And yet of what use would Antiqueños have for leaders who have not done bad yet, and also have not done good in representing our aspirations as a people and province? Maybe your guess is as good if not better than mine.
They should also stop believing that like people are beholden to them for reason of their name, and the power of their offices.
To our leaders whoever you are, and to what particular aggrupation you belong, we have this simple reminder. Please be cognizant of the real sentiment of the people and act to realize something out of this understanding.
People are not dumb not to recognize your efforts. They are as human, discerning humans that is, as you and me./PN
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