Don’t just push it, ram it through
During his last term as Cebu third district congressman, Eddie Gullas sought to widen the national highway connecting the cities of Naga and Carcar. The expansion project would have not only provincial but regional influence, Eddiegul explained at that time, because it would ease the flow of vehicles between Cebu and neighboring islands.
The project cost was estimated at P1.25 billion and Gullas was already assured of at least P625 million from his pork barrel of P250 million and the P400 million that then Cebu City south district rep. Tommy Osmeña gave up in favor of his district’s southern neighbor. Eddiegul vowed not to rest until he was able to source the balance.
Gullas was on his last term in Congress and had planned a wider national highway linking the three cities and the three towns in his district as his legacy to its people. He was on his way to seeing his dream fulfilled until the trees intervened.
The Department of Environment and Natural Resources had already issued a clearance to remove the trees to give way to the road expansion project. There were conditions: earth-ball those that can be earth-balled and replace those that had to be cut down. The arrangement seemed reasonable enough. Many of the trees were decades-old and posed a real danger to the public as they could fall anytime as a few had in fact fallen down.
Environment and heritage advocates would not be appeased, however. These trees are older than most of us and, contrary to DENR opinion, could last decades more, they claimed. One of them, the so-called running priest, Fr. Robert Reyes, went as far as accusing then Naga mayor Val Chiong of being a criminal during a dialogue at the city hall for ordering that trees that stood in the way of the construction of a modern oval be cut. The people who heard the accusation roundly booed the priest and Val ended up apologizing to Reyes for the people’s reaction, saying they were not used to hearing that kind of language used against their mayor--and from a priest yet.
To cut the story short, the few but noisy activists won except in Naga where Val built his oval over the objection of Reyes. Gullas’s dream project was all but aborted, particularly in the San Fernando to Carcar section of the highway.
The activists were right at least on one point: the trees are healthy to this day; at least none had fallen dead. But the dreaded traffic problem that Gullas sought to address has also reared its ugly head to the consternation of commuters and motorists especially in the San Fernando-Carcar link.
A doctor friend, who was returning to the city from a visit to their ancestral home in Carcar last week, discovered that on peak hours it takes at least an hour to negotiate the distance between the two local government units. And there are several similar tales of horror.
I read somewhere that there is now a planned coastal road that will link the Talisay, Minglanilla and Naga. I will not be surprised if incumbent Rep. Samsam Gullas is aggressively pushing the project. He knows how overburdened the highway is and how urgent the need for a bypass road.
The planned road will address the vehicle crowding problem up to Naga City only--the towns farther south will have to wait--but it’s a good start. Let’s hope it will find more success than the ill-starred highway-widening project. I have a nasty feeling that it will again run into all sorts of roadblocks, not the least from environmentalists but I hope I’m wrong.
In behalf of all those who face the oppression of waiting behind a long line of slow-moving vehicles in the near southern part of the highway on a regular basis, let me say, don’t just push it, ram the plan through if necessary, Cong. Sam.