ShareThisCEBU CITY – Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama said the City Government will earmark at least P11 million for next year’s Sinulog celebration, which is P1 million higher compared to last year’s aid for the event.
The mayor said the fund for the Sinulog, one of the biggest cultural events in the country which draws tens of thousands of local and foreign tourists, will be covered under the proposed 2011 annual budget of the City Government.
Ricky Ballesteros, executive director of the Sinulog Foundation Inc. (SFI), said next year’s Sinulog celebration will have a Chinese motif as a way to pay tribute to the Chinese community in the city.
Ballesteros said the plan should have been implemented two years ago but was postponed as it needs more research.
”The idea really is to pay tribute to the Chinese for their contributions to Cebu,” Ballesteros said.
Ballesteros disclosed that in the finale of the Sinulog celebration, which will be held on Jan. 16, 2011, the stage will display a Chinese garden in the morning and will be transformed into a Chinese temple at night.
Ballesteros also said during the grand parade, various Chinese dances will be showcased.
As for ensuring public safety during the event, the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, through the Office of the Civil Defense, has chosen the Sinulog as pilot project for the implementation of the incident command system (ICS).
Office of the Civil Defense (OCD) 7 Director Minda Morante said the ICS is a tool that will be established as part of the city’s existing scene disaster response system in order to improve the city’s emergency response operations in various situations.
”The ICS seeks to ensure effective consequence management during disasters or emergencies. ICS is not only limited to emergencies or complex incidents but it can also be applied to the planning of events like the Sinulog,” Morante said.
Morante said the OCD has chosen Sinulog as the pilot project for the applications of ICS because of the large crowd it draws.
”There are other activities but we consider the Sinulog as one of the festivals that are really big,” she said, adding they have to consider not only the beauty of presentations but consequence management as well, “What if something will happen?” she added.
According to Morante, the ICS will strengthen the coordination among agencies that are front liners in defense and their response to emergencies and disasters.
Members of the Bureau of Fire Protection, Emergency Rescue Unit Foundation, Philippine National Police, Central Command, National Telecommunications Commission and the Cebu Medical Society took an ICS seminar by the OCD at the Social Hall of City Hall.
The establishment of ICS is one of the provisions under the Philippine Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act 2010, which was signed into law by then president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo last May 27.