Cebu City’s embarrassing garbage problem

With the Christmas Season soon to be over with the celebration of the Magi a.k.a. the Three Kings, in Cebu however, we will only be shifting gears for the up and coming Feast of the Sto. Niño de Cebu. While we would be holding a weeklong celebration for the Sinulog Festival, however there are only two main events that millions of Sto. Niño devotees would flock to Cebu City, the solemn procession with the original statue of the Señor Sto. Niño that was brought to Cebu by the Armada de Moluccas of Ferdinand Magellan and the rowdy Sinulog Festival on Sunday on the 3rd week of January.

I gathered that certain events of the Miss Universe Pageant would be held in Cebu, I still have to check out  the venues and times that this would be held. So we expect a very busy January. However the question to ask is… is Cebu City ready to hold its Sinulog Festival? If you looked at our potholed roads one can say that Cebu City is not ready to hold its Fiesta for the Señor Sto. Niño. If you checked out the traffic congestion on a daily basis, we are barely holding on. These problems are mere starters, the bigger problem can be seen on the streets and sidewalks of Cebu City… our garbage! What a major embarrassment for Cebuanos!

Yes, the biggest problem Cebu City faces today is uncollected garbage made worse by the closure by the Department of Environment (DENR) of the Cebu City Sanitary Landfill. This has never happened to Cebu in the past. More than 20 years ago, I was the chairman of the Infrastructure and Utilities Committee (IUC) of the Regional Development Council (RDC-IUC-7) and at that time, Cebu City needed a place to dump its garbage. With the help of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) we constructed the Cebu City Sanitary Landfill. But this had a shelf life of only 20 years. Somehow it has been extended, but in the end, the DENR decided to shut it down last November with Cebu City totally unprepared to tackle this problem.

This week, the Cebu City Council had to call for a special session to come up with a new contract for a private company to haul the city’s garbage out of Cebu City. But for most part of this week, Cebu City residents have been plagued by uncollected garbage where most residents place them on the sidewalks or streets in the most unsanitary way. Unless he fixed the garbage problem soon, Mayor Tomas Osmeña would get the ire of his constituents. Hopefully this week we shall see a solution to this problem.

Meanwhile, the province of Cebu will soon embark on its first Suroy-Soruy Sugbo of the year 2017 heading to the Southern towns of Argao, Boljoon, Santander, Samboan, Ginatilan, Alegria, Moalboal, Ronda and Barili. They call it the Southern Heritage Tour that starts on January 18 to 20th. It’s a three-day, two night tour into some of Cebu’s nature sites and waterfalls that has become a top tourist destination.

The Suroy Suroy Sugbo was the brainchild of former Cebu Governor Gwen F. Garcia, now Congressman of the 3rd District. This is one lasting legacy of Rep. Garcia that allowed Tourism to include that farthest reaches of the Province of Cebu. Previous to the holding of the Suroy Suroy Sugbo, the famous Cebooom focused only in destinations found in Metro Cebu. This project brought a new sense of pride of place with many Cebuanos and now we are seeing new tourism destinations south of Cebu City.

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We started the New Year with high oil pump prices increases. But did you notice that no one is marching the streets demanding a rollback on the prices of gasoline and other fuel products? How times have indeed change. Last year the Automotive Industry enjoyed brisk sales because of cheap gasoline prices… at this point, I would like to believe that the Auto Industry would take a beating in this New Year… except for cars with small thrifty engines. At least in Metro Manila, they have their Light Rail Transit (LRT) or Metro Rail Transit (MRT) as alternatives that the public can use. For us in Metro Cebu we have no such alternative mass transit systems.

But high gasoline prices aren’t a problem for as long as our local governments ensure that traffic-clogged intersections are given top priority by Traffic Management. Indeed, if vehicles do not get stuck in such intersections at least they do not waste gasoline. But then our biggest problem stems from the fact and reality that the Cities of Metro Cebu do not have a planning office that could plan out routes to make traffic move. Most local Traffic Management Offices merely work on handling day-to-day traffic. But no one, but no one looks into how to improve our roads to ease traffic congestion.

This is why it is imperative that our Local Traffic Authorities get trained on how to improve the traffic or road conditions of our Metro Cities so as to help motorist reduce their time sitting on traffic congested roads and wasting precious gasoline.

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