Nabbed suspect’s claim tightens political battle in Samar

TACLOBAN CITY, Dec. 19 -- The arrest of a murder suspect has deepened political divides in Samar province even among members of family.

In a statement issued Tuesday, San Jorge, Samar Mayor Joseph Grey refuted the claim of his son, Francis, who pointed to Calbayog Mayor Ronaldo Aquino and retired army official Emil Zosa as masterminds of the killing of a village chief two years ago.

Authorities arrested the mayor’s son on Dec. 7 at the suspect’s hideout in Balihai Subdivision in Imus, Cavite. In a media interview upon his arrival in this city on Dec. 14, Francis named the re-electionist mayor of Calbayog and the Samar gubernatorial bet as behind the murder.

The younger Grey admitted that he killed Romulo Barcoma, a village chief of Sapinet in San Jorge town acting on orders of the two politicians.

“I don’t know what happened to my son, but I want to clear this. Zosa and Aquino were not involved in that murder case. The confessions were extracted under duress,” the mayor said.

“The three of us are friends and we belong to the same party. These people behind all of this is doing everything for us to fight and lost each other’s trust.”

Francis’ statements were already contained in an extra judicial confession subscribed and sworn to before a lawyer in Quezon City.

In a press briefing Wednesday afternoon, Aquino denied all accusations hurled against their group since they are peace-loving officials.

"This is politically-motivated. The truth is that village officials who are supportive to us have been harassed by our opponents," Aquino said.

Samar Governor Sharee Ann Tan said they are not involved in the arrest of Samar’s most wanted person.

“I watched the interview with Francis Grey as posted on social media. The process was an entire police operations and since there was a crime committed, someone has to be answerable. We never had a chance to talk to the suspect,” Tan told reporters on Tuesday.

She said it is always possible that their political opponents may run a propaganda, to appear that their family is behind these smear campaign considering that the officials and personalities mentioned by Francis are their political opponents in the past elections.

“I am calling for my party mates and my political opponents to aspire for a peaceful election, to campaign hard and not to resort to violence. Let the people decide as to whom they want to vote and whom they want serve,” said Tan, who is seeking to represent Samar’s 2nd district in Congress.

The governor’s mother, Milagrosa, the incumbent representative, will run for governor, the post she held for nine years until 2010 with Zosa, who ran and lost in the previous election against Sharee Ann. He is the husband of Santa Margarita town Mayor Gemma Zosa.

Aquino’s reelection bid is challenged by former Calbayog Councilor Raymun Uy, an ally of Tan’s political clan. (LAAA/JSA/PNA)

Samar province enlists Balangiga in tourism campaign

CATBALOGAN CITY, Samar, Dec. 18 – The Spark Samar campaign of the provincial government here will soon include the town of Balangiga, Eastern Samar in its tourism promotion program. 

Samar Governor Sharee Ann Tan-de los Santos said in an interview Tuesday that they already had an initial talk with the Department of Tourism on the plan to include the historic town in their tourism circuit.

The governor said the Balangiga bells' return will surely boost tourism in Samar Island because of its national significance. People are eager to see the bells that have been out of the country for 117 years, she said.

“I hope that Eastern Samar province will be glad to collaborate with Samar province regarding the tourism program,” Tan said.

Balangiga is 30-minute drive from Marabut, Samar where the Marabut rock formations are located. The site is one of the top destinations under the Spark Samar tourism campaign.

Tan said that aside from the Balangiga Bells, the lighting of San Juanico Bridge next year is also expected to boost tourism arrivals in Samar.

Now that the bells are back, the DOT expects more tourists to visit not just the sleepy town, but the entire Samar Island.

The DOT has started capacitating the town’s tourism stakeholders through the provision of training and PHP9.7-million funding to enhance the Balangiga Incident Marker. 

The department also provided more than PHP600,000 for the acquisition of gears for tourists. 

"Enhancing other tourist destinations in Balangiga will make visitors stay longer, giving them the opportunity to get to know our people, experience our culture, taste our cuisine and discover the infinite escapes in Eastern Visayas," said DOT Regional Director Karina Rosa Tiopes in an earlier interview. 

Balangiga town is known for the Balangiga Encounter that happened on Sept. 28, 1901, when residents, led by Valeriano Abanador, initiated an attack against US soldiers.

The villagers killed 54 American soldiers using bolos. It was the biggest defeat of the foreign troops during the Philippine-American war.

In retaliation, the US soldiers attacked the town, killing anyone who could carry firearms. The Americans then took the Balangiga bells after turning the town into a “howling wilderness”.

Two of the three bells used to be enshrined at Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne, Wyoming while the third bell was at Camp Red Cloud in South Korea.

The bells were returned to Balangiga in an emotional handover ceremony led by President Rodrigo Duterte last Saturday, December 15.  (RTA/PNA)

Plans laid for tourists’ influx in Balangiga

BALANGIGA, Eastern Samar, Dec. 17 – The Department of Tourism (DOT) has mapped out measures to prepare this historic town for the influx of tourists who want to see the three Balangiga Bells returned by the US government after more than a century.

DOT Regional Director Karina Rosa Tiopes said they will start the accreditation of potential houses whose owners are willing to be part of the homestay program to address the lack of accommodation for visitors in town.

“Prior to the handover, the local government talked with residents to accommodate guests who would stay there overnight. To make this all sustainable, we will assist them in organizing homestay facilities,” Tiopes told reporters Saturday night.

Homestay is a tourism program that allows visitors to rent a room from a local family who earns additional income. This will also enable tourists to immerse with the locals and learn the Filipino culture.

Other preparations set by the DOT include trainings for mangrove paddling guides, waiter servicing and food handling, community tour guides, mountain guides, effective customer service and entrepreneurial development.

DOT also provided funds for the procurement of livelihood gears such as kayak with paddles, personal flotation device, fisherman’s hat, rash guards, first aid kits, tents, solar lamps, beach umbrella, plastic tables, monoblock chairs, abseiling ropes, harness, carabineers and various office supplies for Bayakha Falls, Ladder-Bangon Falls and Sitio Marag Mangroves.

“Enhancing other tourist destinations in Balangiga will make visitors stay longer, giving them the opportunity to get to know our people, experience our culture, taste our cuisine and discover the Infinite Escapes in Eastern Visayas” Tiopes added.

The DOT will also train tour guide for them to be able to tell one story -- the bravery and heroism of the people of Balangiga.

“Tourism development is a long journey, but we will take the initial step," Tiopes said.

For tourists to get a better view of the Balangiga Incident Marker, the tourism department is proposing to transfer the town’s existing gymnasium to another location.

The marker is the work of National Artist Napoleon Abueva, inaugurated on the 102nd commemoration of Balangiga Encounter on Sept. 28, 2003.

“We are asking funds from the Department of Public Works and Highways and Tourism Infrastructure and Enterprise Zone Authority for the construction of new gymnasium and improve the landscape of the town’s plaza,” Tiopes added.

Part of the proposal is to build a visitors’ center and a souvenir shop near the marker.

Samar Governor Sharee Ann Tan who witnessed the handover of bells on Saturday said they will include Balangiga as one of the destinations under the Spark Samar tourism campaign even if Balangiga town is in Eastern Samar.

“The return of these historic bells will greatly benefit our tourism in the province especially those Samar towns close to Balangiga. This is will really boost our tourism promotion drive since the bells are known internationally,” Tan said.

Tan will meet with provincial officials of Eastern Samar to collaborate tourism promotion efforts more so that the DOT came up with a master plan for the three Samar provinces as one Samar Island.

Balangiga Bells are church bells originally from the Parish of Balangiga in Borongan, Eastern Samar.

The bells were taken by American soldiers back in 1901 as war booty after American soldiers killed the town’s people, an event historically known as the Balangiga Massacre.

Prior to the bloody massacre, Filipino insurgents were said to have used the church bells to signal an attack against American soldiers at the dawn of Sept. 28, 1901. About 48 American soldiers who were part of Company C of the 9th US Infantry were killed by the insurgents armed with bolos.

In retaliation, Brig. Gen. Jacob Smith ordered for Samar to be turned into a “howling wilderness,” in which American soldiers burned the town, and to kill everyone over the age of 10. The bloody incident is now known as the Balangiga Encounter. (SQM/PNA)

Snail fever outbreak in non-endemic Leyte area alarms DOH

TACLOBAN CITY, Dec.17 -- Concerns have been raised over the schistosomiasis outbreak in Baybay City, an area not known as endemic of this chronic parasitic disease.

Roderick Boyd Cerro, Department of Health (DOH) regional chief of epidemiology and surveillance unit, said the outbreak in three villages in Baybay City caught them by surprise since Baybay has no single case of snail fever in the past decade.

“The city health office said Baybay is not known to be an endemic area for schistosomiasis, and they could not recall any reported cases in the last 10 years in the city,” Cerro said in an interview Monday.

Cerro attributed the outbreak to the frequent travel of people from the city's farming villages to other endemic areas in Leyte.

Transmission occurs when people suffering from schistosomiasis contaminate freshwater sources with their feces containing parasite eggs, which hatch in the water.

Victims experience headache, weakness, abdominal pain, fever, cough, diarrhea, itchy rash, and bloody stools. Several of them were confined at the Schistosomiasis hospital in Palo, Leyte.

Since November until early December, at least 57 cases have been reported in Villa Solidaridad, Mailhi, and Monteverde villages in Baybay, with an attack rate of 22 percent for every 100 population.

Schistosomiasis is endemic in 25 areas in Leyte province. These are Abuyog, Alangalang, Babatngon, Barugo, Burauen, Carigara, Dagami, Dulag, Jaro, Javier, Julita, La Paz, Macarthur, Mayorga, Matag-ob, Palo, Pastrana, San Miguel, Sta. Fe, Tabontabon, Tacloban City, Tanauan, Tolosa, Tunga, and Villaba.

In the national listings, four of the region’s six provinces –Leyte, Northern Samar, Samar, Eastern Samar– are categorized as high endemic areas.

Of the 878,777 exposed populations, 338,842 are in Leyte; 113,175 in Samar; 206,043 in Eastern Samar; and 220,717 in Northern Samar.

The health department has no available data on the number of persons infected with schistosomiasis, but they claimed there have been deaths due to the disease every year.

The first epidemic of schistosomiasis in the region occurred among Americans and allied forces after landing in Leyte during World War II in 1944.

The disease is also known as snail fever as people become infected when larval forms of the parasite released by freshwater snails penetrate the skin during contact with infested water. (SQM/PNA)

Peace, friendship dominate Balangiga Bells handover

BALANGIGA, Eastern Samar, Dec. 16 -- It was indeed a day of friendship and peace in this town when President Rodrigo Duterte witnessed the handover of Balangiga Bells seized by the US government for 117 years.

The President arrived at around 5 p.m. Saturday at the town’s covered court where hundreds of government officials, Roman Catholic priests, and residents gathered to witness the historic event.

After greeting Cabinet officials at the left side of the covered hall, Duterte proceeded to the other side to shake hands with top church officials led by Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) President and Davao Archbishop Romulo Valles, whom the Chief Executive identified as his “personal spiritual guidance counsellor.”

The President’s friendly gesture to the CBCP leader has elicited big applause from the crowd as people watched the blow-by-blow event on big screen set up by the Presidential Broadcast Staff Radio-Television Malacañang.

The President also shook the hands of Borongan, Eastern Samar Diocese Bishop Crispin Varquez, Papal Nuncio to the Philippines Archbishop Gabriele Giordano Caccia, Archbishop of the US Military Ordinariate Timothy Broglio and other church officials seated in front facing the stage.

“The rest of the Filipino nation joins the Diocese of Borongan in celebrating this historic event. Indeed, this victory is the result of the optimism and solidarity and patriotism of those behind the bells’ return, just like when our forefathers fought for freedom against foreign domination more than a century ago,” Duterte told the crowd.

US Embassy Deputy Chief of Mission John Law and Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Joseph Felter represented the US government at the return ceremony of the Balangiga Bells in this town.

“The return of the Bells of Balangiga demonstrates the enduring strength of the U.S.-Philippine alliance and the deep bonds of friendship between the peoples of our nations, as we work together to advance a free and open Indo-Pacific,” the US Embassy said in a statement.

Minutes before the handover ceremony, Valles told reporters that “the bells’ repatriation underlines deeper appreciation of respect and friendship.”

Varquez echoed Valles’s statement saying the bells’ homecoming “is a symbol of peace and reconciliation and remind us that we have to move on from the Balangiga Encounter.”

A few hours after the handover, a post circulated on social media claiming that priests, including top church officials, were earlier told to go out of the venue since Duterte only wants Valles to be in the area.

The post also claimed that “priests present were asked to remove their Roman collars so as not to offend the President. Also, chairs were placed in front of the priests to cover them.”

Facebook user Aloysius Trejo observed in the video that “the President cordially greeted and shook hands with church officials and even waved to other local priests at the far end of the row while on his way to the stage.”

“It is not a directive of the President. Before his speech, he greeted the Apostolic Nuncio and even called Archbishop Valles his personal spiritual guidance counsellor,” he said.

Another Facebook user Nnie Que tagged the post as “malicious and makes no sense other than to sow intrigue.”

Borongan diocese officials are unavailable for comments on the issue. (SQM/PNA)