FORMER Bacolod City mayor Oscar Verdeflor was honored with a 21-gun salute as he was laid to rest at Rose Lawns Memorial Park in Barangay Bata on Saturday.
Hundreds of Verdeflor’s supporters joined his family in paying their last respects to late mayor, along with Mayor Evelio Leonardia, Councilors Ricardo Tan, Elmer Sy, and Sonya Verdeflor, and former councilors Catalino Alisbo, Archie Baribar, and Alex Paglumotan.
Verdeflor, who was 80, was mayor of Bacolod for one term from 1998 to 2001. He succumbed to septic shock on Nov. 21 at the Dr. Pablo O. Torre Memorial Hospital in Bacolod.
He is survived by his wife Barbara and their five children.
Mrs. Verdeflor said she is thankful for their supporters, relatives, friends, and city officials for expressing their sympathies.
She said that when her husband had a stroke, he was paralyzed and never recovered.
“From an active person to not be able to move is very frustrating and he endured that for 15 years,” she added. “We feel the pain of our loss and it may be some time for us to get over it, but we had the memory, the memory that he left us in our hearts.”
In his message at the necrological service, Leonardia said, “We are here to honor a man who had served the city. Words may not be enough to express the grief, particularly what the family is experiencing and the rest of the city. But if I have to give these words of comfort, I would say Mayor Oca was a man of destiny.”
Leonardia said Verdeflor was an example of what his own late brother Cesar [Leonardia] told him, “Kun swerte sang tawo, swerte niya gid na ya. Kun iya, iya ina,” referring to Verdeflor’s election as mayor in 1998.
“I say that he is a man of destiny because he started with humble beginnings, and ventured beyond the shores of Bacolod and go to the United States and stayed there for so long. It is always a struggle, as you know, when you are in a foreign land, and when he came back, he fulfilled his dreams,” Leonardia added.