1:15. a. m., Saturday morning. Something sets the dogs off. Outside there's the sound of hammering and then the fart and clatter of a trisikad moving off. Someone has been nailing election posters to the wooden utility pole opposite Casa Covington.
I look in the morning. The posters belong to a Davao councilor who's running for congress. Wouldn't it be grand if our city 'dads' addressed Davao's woes with the same zeal?
Another councilor in the news last week was Leonardo Avila who was reported as being 'proud' that the city on Tuesday passed the 'Older persons welfare code of Davao City'.
Quite right too - the code has a list of oldie goodies as long as your arm - increasing oldie participation in city governance, more oldie employment, even oldie Olympics but, Councilor Avila, why don't you stroll downstairs to the oldie bureau in their broom cupboard office under the stairs and ask why there's been no senior citizen discount booklets available for more than TWO MONTHS.
Is this another example of Davao trying to run before it can walk. It seems pointless approving all those wonderful oldie benefits when senior citizens for the want of a folded sheet of paper cannot even claim their senior citizen discount on basic foodstuffs. Crack the whip councilor!
Another outfit that could do with a whip snapping about their ears is Davao Light. Thanks to their infinitely elastic rotating brownout scheduling life in Davao has become one giant game of chance. Will the ATM be working? Does the baker have any bread (He lost the last batch thanks to an early brownout)? Will the resto have any air-conditioning or even be open? Go out at night? You have to be joking.
Singlehandedly Davao Light is surely and not so slowly throttling Davao commerce.
Friday I was astonished to be told that the SP building has no back-up generator. They have a multi-million gazebo of use to no-one parked on the roof but if the lights go off the business bureau, the assessor's office, the city treasurer's office and all those little bunkers upstairs down tools for three hours.
Employees sweat, customers curse and the backlog backs up. Why not introduce flexitime? Shift office hours to when the current is on (If Davao Light can be persuaded to stick to a schedule).
Lastly lastly, why are those colored plastic wrist bangles called 'ballers'?