THE 5th Kalamayan and Christmas Festival kicked off in Victorias City Saturday, December 15.
Victorias City Mayor Francis Frederick Palanca led the opening rites with the holding of the Lantern Dance competition which was participated by Youth Council officials.
Palanca said that 2018 has been a good year for Victorias as it is a year of harvest of excellence as they got about six or seven major awards from national agencies in terms of performance.
He said that with the Lantern Dance Festival, he saw the capacity and talents of the youth leaders.
He added that the festival is the celebration of the sugar industry.
“We put up this festival because Victorias is the seat of sugar industry with the operation of Victorias Milling Company in our city. This is a pre-hundred anniversary of VMC where the sugar industry was established in 1919. It is also a celebration as God has been good to Victorias. Abundance has been felt. We have become a city of events and our investments in 2017 and 2018 have improved our performance,” the mayor said.
“Kalamayan is really a festival where our city becomes a Christmas City where our people with small income had the chance to improve their earnings with this festival,” he added.
Meanwhile, the winners in the Lantern Dance competition are the Youth Council leaders from Barangays 21, 7, 5, and 4 as first runner-up with P10,000 cash prize; 2nd runner-up went to Barangays 17, 18, 19 and 19-A with P8,000 cash prize; and 3rd runner-up includes Barangays 15, 15-A, 16 and 16-A with P6,000 cash prize.
The city also gave P3,000 each to the participating group that did not make it to the top. (CNC