MEDIUM RARE
Jullie Y. Daza
Who cares?
If it’s an option, it’s either you may do it or you don’t have to.
Cebu has got it right. But then Cebu has always challenged the power of “imperial Manila” to impose its will on everybody else, Batanes to Tawi-Tawi. Gov. Gwen Garcia held her own against President Duterte on airport protocols, and the guy quietly backed off. His tough talk versus the gobernadora’s unflinching stand? He had no option, calling to mind what another mayor, Manila’s Fred Lim, considered his eleventh commandment: Don’t argue with a woman.
Now Cebu City Mayor Rama is first among LGU’s to question the must-mask mandate. Both mayor and governor invoke local autonomy and the principle, simply put, that nobody knows what’s happening on their turf better than its local leaders — not Malcañang, not IATF and its generally anonymous board of generals and experts who’ve been calling the shots for so long that heeding their instructions has become a religion.
To mask or not to mask? Ask the man/woman on the street and their opinions would border on the option that ‘tis better to be safe than sorry. Yes, they’ll keep their masks on when they’re inside buses, jeepneys, malls, they’ll teach the kids to do the same in class. The only gray area seems to be the wide open outdoors, where masks won’t be necessary, but are the outdoors really wide and open in cities like Metro Manila, the most congested in the world?
Before the mask-unmask option, Education Secretary Sara Duterte told parents and teachers to consider as optional the wearing of school uniforms by their kids. Her words set off a flurry of yes-and-no’s, ending only when the adults spoke with one voice, that donning a uniform was a practical thing to do, all part and parcel of the ritual of reporting for class.
“We have learned to live with Covid,” observed Joey Concepcion. I should like him to meet a trio of lovely senior citizens who are so careful about their health and wellbeing, and their families’, that nothing in the world, not even two primary vaccine shots and two boosters, is enough — for now — to convince them to come out, come out, the coast is (almost) clear.