Wednesday, May 07, 2008 Villages to move, with or without Hanjin: Uy By Annabelle L. Ricalde
IN AN age of industrial expansion, even schools and barangays have to move, too.
New administrative villages will be carved out of the 35 hectares relocation site for the affected families in the discontinued $2-billion shipyard in Villanueva town, Misamis Oriental, officials said.
Villanueva Mayor Juliet Uy said the adjacent Barangays Balacanas and Tambobong will continue to exist as administrative zones and its officials retained -- only that the villages will be governed this time in a contiguous albeit new area, with new schools and basic community facilities.
"These two villages will now be called New Balacanas and New Tambobong. The law does not allow for their dissolution, as they still have constituents to serve," Mayor Uy told Sun.Star Cagayan de Oro Monday.
Residents of Balacanas and Tambobong -- now almost a barren land after South Korean giant Hanjin began clearing the area of crops and houses for its shipyard facility early this year -- are being relocated to Barangay Katipunan, an elevated portion of the town.
Uy made it clear that whether Hanjin would return or completely abandon its billion-dollar project, the transfer of the two villages would have to push through.
The same fate would fall on barangays within the Phividec Industrial Estate, she said, stressing the need to clear the sprawling industrial zone of inhabitants for future developments.
"Even if the shipyard project would not push through -- which I hope it will --these areas will still be used by future investors," she said. "We will be relieved of future problems if we clear these areas now."
With its roughly 400 pupils relocating to their new homes afar, the Japanese-era Balacanas Elementary School, which serves both villages, is faced with no choice but to transfer.
The school will be uprooted along with the two barangays' basic facilities --basketball court, chapel, health center and their respective barangay halls.
However, parents and school officials are in limbo where to hold the next classes. With the school opening already around, a new school building has yet to be constructed.
Phividec said it has paid P13 million for all the properties of both barangays, including the grade school and a day care center. It puzzles both parents and Education officials whether the school can still be used for classes.
Balacanas Elementary School principal Grace Magallanes said town officials had suggested that they distribute the pupils in schools nearby.
However, Magallanes said local education officials found the suggestion impractical. They also instructed teachers to conduct the enrollment and hold classes in the already purchased school building.
Faced with uncertainties, Parents Teachers Association (PTA) president Ramil Factura said their children might be forced to study under the trees.
He lamented that a new school building should have been built well before the enrollment period. (With reports from DVAIII)
