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Thursday, January 26, 2006
2 ex-justices top Chinese New Year awardees
RETIRED Court of Appeals (CA) justices Romeo Brawner and Salvador Valdez Jr., two of Baguio City's top legal luminaries, lead this year's crop of awardees in the search for outstanding citizens as a highlighting feature of the city's traditional celebration of the Chinese Spring Festival.
The two will join three businessmen and three women who will be honored during a testimonial dinner Thursday evening to cap the festivities ushering in the Year of the Dog in the Chinese lunar calendar.
Baguio City Mayor Braulio Yaranon, chairman of the event executive committee, said Ambassador Li Jinjun of the People's Republic of China, has been invited as guest of honor and speaker.
Search committee chairman Charles Cheng and City Administrator Peter Fianza, the festival coordinator, said the eight awardees will be cited for their contributions to the city's development and promotion of Filipino-Chinese friendship and cooperation.
The other awardees are Jimmy Uy, Lorenzo Ong, Evelyn Ng and Ang Ye Ping, all for business and civic work; nurse Mary Fernandez for community service; and former barangay chairwoman Maria Cordoviz who will be cited for public service.
Brawner, who retired as presiding justice of the CA last September 18, took his oath as election commissioner the following day. A graduate from the University of the Philippines (UP), he served as prosecutor for 11 years, city judge of Baguio for eight years, law professor for 24 years, Regional Trial Court (RTC) judge for 12 years and associate justice for 10 years.
The Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) honored Brawner as the country's most outstanding city judge of the country in 1980 while the Foundation for Judicial Excellence (FJE) conferred on him the Chief Justice Jose Laurel Award, also for judicial excellence as outstanding RTC judge in 1995.
Valdez, another multi-awarded legal authority, also served as associate justice of the CA for 10 years before his retirement last November. In the government service for more than 36 years, he served as assistant city fiscal of Baguio, district judge of the Court of First Instance (CFI) and RTC judge. He also taught criminal law at the St. Louis University (SLU) and the then Baguio Colleges Foundation now University of the Cordilleras (UC) and served as lecturer in various national conventions and seminars of law practitioners.
Also a law graduate (cum laude) from UP, Valdez ranked 14th in the 1959 bar examinations. He was chosen as the outstanding RTC judge of the Philippines and given the Cayetano Arellano Award for judicial excellence in 1993 by the FJE.
The two former justices also received the Outstanding Baguio Citizen Award in 1997.
Uy, who will be cited for business enterprise and civic work, is the president of the Philippine Tiok Lim Grand Mason, Inc. (PTLGM). A resident of Baguio for 29 years now, he manages a bakery supplies and equipment mart and a fastfood center.
Ong is a former president of the Association for Philippine-China Understanding (Apcu), vice president of the Amity Club (AC) and a member of the board of trustees of the Baguio Patriotic High School (BPHS).
Ng, wife of hotelier-civic leader Peter Ng, had been cited several times for her contributions to the promotion of marathon, basketball and other sports in the grassroots level and development tourism in Baguio and the Cordillera region. She is also a presidential merit awardee of the Zonta Club of Baguio (ZCB).
Ang, a vegetable dealer, takes time out of managing his business to serve as vice president and treasurer of Apcu.
Fernandez served Baguio continuously for more than 49 years until her retirement as Nurse V of the Baguio Health Department (BHD) on Jan. 1, 2001. She rose from the ranks, starting out as a nurse supervisor and then as public health nurse, chief of the nursing services section and chief public health nurse.
Now 92 years old, Cordoviz served for many years as chairwoman of Barangay Kagitingan until her resignation for health reasons in March last year. A recipient of various awards as outstanding mother and for public service, she remains an active member of the Baguio Federation of Women's Clubs (BFWC).
The festival, launched Monday, took on a humanitarian dimension Wednesday afternoon with a gift sharing with indigent families in Barangay Fairview.
The celebration will peak on Friday afternoon with the traditional parade along the city's main streets, followed by a fireworks display at the Burnham Park. (RD)
(January 26, 2006 issue)
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