Rosario opens cemetery for LGBTs

ROSARIO, Cavite — This first-class municipality has its own cemetery for the so-called LGBTs (lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders) which is the first in the country and, perhaps, the only one in the world.

The municipal government also allowed the LGBTs to work in any local offices or field. Just last year, it allowed gays to work as traffic enforcers and firemen.

Mayor Jose “Nonong” Ricafrente Jr., a lawyer by profession, said there is no discrimination in the municipality and that they (the LGBTs ) have all the rights to live and work in the area.

The needy LGBTs are also included in the “womb- to- tomb program” of the municipal administration which renders, among others, free education and funeral services and burial.

In 2015, the local government, with the land given by a private firm, allotted a two-hectare space in Barangay Tejero to be used as cemetery for the LGBTs. The final resting place, dubbed “Ikatlo,” has 200 apartmenttype niches with scores ready for use.

Municipal Media Coordinator Sid Luna Samaniego said at least one, a lesbian, was buried in the LGBT area in Salinas Garden of Memories. Rosario is also called Salinas by town folk. The land for cemetery use was donated by a “good samaritan”-private firm, said Ricafrente.

The LGBT niches have markers in varied colors for identification. Pink are for the gays while the green for lesbians. The niches were given by the private Heaven’s Garden Memorial Park.

At least 23 hectares of the donated cemetery land were divided for the municipality’s 20 barangays (villages) the Filipino-Muslim community and LGBTs. Samaniego said that the cemetery is exclusively for the dead of the needy families.