Bb. Silangang Samar Pageant: Sugar Coating the Real Problem of Eastern Samar
by: Silver Cepeda
"The 2009 official poverty statistics released by the National Statistical Coordination Board showed that poverty incidence among families in Eastern Visayas increased from 31.1 percent in 2006 to 33.2 percent in 2009. The latest figure indicates that around 1 in every 3 families in the region is poor.
Eastern Visayas ranked 5th in terms of highest poverty incidence among the 17 regions in the country in 2009. Its poverty incidence is 12.3 percentage points higher than that of the country, which is estimated at 20.9 percent."
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If you search in google.com nowadays you can discover that typing the keywords, "Eastern Samar poor" auto populates and has a lot of sites mentioning it. Above is a paper or a quote that briefly discusses the problem in my hometown.
November 8, 2012 there is an event in Borongan E. Samar that is suppose to help the problem of tourism. If we give it a thought, a minute to ponder. Is it really the problem of the province. Is it not poverty? I don't know where the organizers of this event got the idea that we need to promote tourism. Well, it might be a solution. Might, but not entirely. If tourism is good in the province then the lifestyle or the condition of the people might improve. I can follow that logic! But only the blind and the insensitive can agree with that. No matter how someone would push for the tourism of the Province if our roads continues to be dubbed as "thousand islands" then you can forget promoting anything. You might want to flush the whole thing down the drain for it defeats itself. I think one of the organizers responded that they are propagating the concept of Agri-Tourism. Are you kidding me? Do they know the real situation of Agriculture in the province? The fact that some farmers can't plant anything because they don't have anything! These are the answers that I am suppose to accept. Stupidity beyond measure. Tourism is a secondary problem of the province. Check this website: here. Click that link and you will hear the cry of the people. People that can't even reveal their names because they are afraid of what might happen to them. And your solution to these problem is a Beauty Pageant. How insensitive can you get?
I am not against the contestants of this Beauty Pageant. Neither am I endorsing anyone. I just hate people offering solutions that does not answer anything. I beg to differ. This event sugarcoats what is happening in the Province. I mean, it promotes tourism? Ok! Let's go to Homonhon Island where we can see the Magellan's Landing. Have you been there? Have you seen how mining corrupts the environment of Homonhon and other places of Eastern Samar? And yet we tend to close our eyes. We tend to shut our ears. I can't believe this! Eastern Samar has a lot of problem now instead of driving awareness and pushing for a solution the organizers came up with this event. How totally irresponsible!
I invite the ones reading this article. Watch that pageant and ask yourself. "How is this going to solve Eastern Samar's Problem"? If they offer an answer, then I am wrong... If they don't then I am right to claim that this is a sugar coating!
2 comments:
Even the poorest of the poor knows how to have fun... what's wrong with appreciating the beauty around us, including our women? It doesn't mean that because there is this pageant nothing is being done about the problem of poverty. Neither does it mean that because we are poor, everything we do will be about alleviating poverty. There is a lot more to life than riches or poverty.
Hi, i just want to make a comment about your post. "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy". Isa yan sa mga reason kung bakit meron pa ring ganyang events even in other poor countries. Let me give you an example.. Bakit yung ibang mahihirap na bansa sumasama sa Olympics kahit ilang events lang sasalihan despite the huge cost of sending athletes? Kasi they want to show the world na may ipagmamalaki sila kahit mahirap lang sila. Same with the pageant, it is not a long term solution pero yung macheer up mo yung mga tao is a good start. Saka you should be proud kasi you live in a place na maraming magaganda :D
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