ONE positive thing, notwithstanding the overwhelming negatives, brought by Covid-19 is the challenge it presses on Filipino resiliency.
The Filipino capacity to stand up and still survive from difficulties or crisis caused by Covid-19 has been proven once more despite government’s lack of basic support and compassion for its people in dire strait.
I am also a witness to destitute families of five or more surviving on a noodle pack and sardine with a kilo of rice. I knew of vulnerable families under lockdown without food for weeks yet managed to survive through some neighbors sneaking in some little help.
I also came to learn of others, especially senior citizens and persons with physical impairment, who only had water, biscuits and spoiled goods given them, yet keeping their will to survive focused on the light at the end of the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ).
Most, despite the terrorized climate imposed on them, managed to transcend their physical needs to something spiritual and psychological weapon, all for the sole reason to survive.
I talked to some elders who made some parallelism of the terror and hunger they experienced during first five months of Covid-19 to their life during the colonial and fascist rule of the Japanese imperial forces.
The middle class, the small entrepreneurs, have had to stretch their small income and little savings until general community quarantine (GCQ) and modified general community quarantine (MGCQ) times.
Even now, when quarantine measures have been scaled down, majority are still struggling to cope with the crisis. With no immediate hope for government substantive relief and rehab assistance, they have to work harder and smarter yet spend little, consume little, and do away with unnecessary.
Micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) have to operate little by little and one step at a time.
Of course, our people can survive, they have survived and they will with all possible means in their reach even for decades more. History of struggles, from generation to generation to the present, have tempered their surviving spirit and their will to fight.
But being a part of society and constituents of the ruling state, they cannot be left on their own. They need some support to recover and be able to stand firmly on their own.
The ruling government has all the necessary resources, important powers, network and authority to move local economy, refuel people towards standing on their own and sparkling their hope for a fairer and just future.
Incidentally, October is also the Masskara month for Bacolod and Panaad Festival for Negros Occidental.
My friend Dr. Edwin Miraflor of Bacolod City Health Office messaged me the other day saying and reminding of the importance of Masskara as a cultural event, as it is spirit to uplift the demoralized Negrense spirit owing to the MV Don Juan sinking and the fall of the sugar industry. Now more than ever in this time of epidemic, the Bacolodnons and Negrenses need to commemorate Masskara. The indomitable spirit of the Negrense and the Bacolodnon shall not be faltered by Covid.
Indeed, Doc, we can still relive the Masskara spirit in our communities and families in whatever ways possible.
The same, too, for Panaad, a festival that is supposed to give tribute to the indigenous spirit, resilience, collective life and entrepreneurship of Negrenses as powerful shield against calamities and other disasters that beset the island now and then.
Despite the odds, the contradictions, ironies, vagueness and uncertainties of the present crisis caused by Covid-19 pandemic or plandemic, I am confident, Bacolodnon and Negrenses, will get over these.
I just hope that the best minds and bodies among us, the warrior classes and local government officials, will come forward, not just to survive the crisis mechanically but do some reconfiguration of the ruling system and local governance towards something better, fair and just for all.