Historic Eastern Samar town needs PHP90M for road projects

BALANGIGA, Eastern Samar, Sept. 30 (PNA) -– The local government here has asked the Department of Agriculture to finance PHP90 million worth of farm-to-market road projects in this town.

The project will finance the pavement of nine kilometers road linking the poor villages in this historic town to the commercial district, said Mayor Randy Graza.

The local chief executive presented the proposal to Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol during the latter’s recent surprise visit to this town as ordered by President Rodrigo Duterte.

“It was an opportunity for us to present the immediate concerns of our town like communal irrigation, farm-to-market roads that would connect several villages to the town center, among others,” Graza said.

Piñol made a stop in this town after attending the gathering of fishermen, farmers, church and government officials in the annual Samar Island Program for Peace and Development (SIPPAD) in Borongan City, the provincial capital.

“When President Duterte learned that I would be in Eastern Samar, he instructed me to pay a visit to Balangiga, a quaint coastal town whose brave men wrote history 115 years ago,” Piñol said on his Facebook post.

“The President said take some pictures and talk to the people there,” Piñol added.

The Agriculture chief instructed DA Region 8 Director Wilson Cerbito to undertake an engineering study of the proposal. Once validated, the proposal will be funded under the Philippine Rural Development Program (PRDP).

The bravery of the people of Balangiga on September 28, 1901 is part of the Philippine history when knives and bolo-wielding men dressed like women in baro’t saya (Filipina attire in that era) of the town made a surprise attack to the soldiers including officers of the Company C of the 9th U.S. Infantry Regiment while they were having breakfast.

In the six weeks that US soldiers were in the town, they were manipulating and oppressing the townspeople. They apprehended them when they disregarded the soldiers’ order to clean the plaza and the whole town because officers were coming.

There were 54 American soldiers who were killed.

In reprisal General Jacob H. Smith ordered the town as “howling wilderness.” Boys ten years old and above capable of carrying firearms were ordered killed and the whole town burned.

They looted the three bells from the burned church as war booty.

Smith and his subordinate were later court-martialed for their vengeance against the civilian Filipinos.

Graza said that all the projects that would be implemented in Balangiga are a show of admiration by President Rodrigo Duterte of the brave residents. (PNA)
LAP/SQM/VICKY C. ARNAIZ/EGR