The Negros Island Region will formally come to an end on Oct. 9, and Negros Oriental and Negros Occidental will revert to their erstwhile regional groupings.
Interior & Local Government Undersecretary Austere Panadero relayed the information to Negros Island officials during a transition meeting Tuesday in Talisay City.
However, even with the dissolution of the NIR, the two Negros provinces will push for the creation of the Negros Island Special Development Area (NISDA), a proposal of the Negros Oriental Chamber of Commerce & Industry Inc. and the Metro Bacolod Chamber of Commerce.
Once approved by the President, a NISDA will convene the two Negros provinces regularly to continue the integrated area development planning, and endorse the inclusion of common areas of concern to the national government for funding and project implementation.
“Our objective is that services will be maintained in Negros without the overhead cost of regional offices,” Panadero said.
The two Negros provinces are also asking the President to keep the status quo on the one-island security command, and the continuation of integrated development and joint disaster risk reduction and management in Negros Occidental and Oriental.
Some agencies requested that their NIR offices be made satellite regional offices, while some asked for at least a Project Management Office to continue program implementation, especially on projects with timelines to meet.
Meanwhile, Education Secretary Leonor Magtolis-Briones said no amount of administrative order can disunite the two provinces of Negros Oriental and Negros Occidental.
In a speech during the awarding ceremony of the best implementers of Brigada Eskwela of DepEd Negros Island Region held Monday evening at the Negros Oriental Convention Center, Briones stressed the two provinces of Negros Island have stated to unite one year and eight months ago and they cannot be disunited anymore even with an Executive Order from President Duterte who dissolved the region.
She said the DepEd family has absolved the habit of going back and forth from Bacolod City in Negros Oriental and vice versa, and has started to understand each other’s peculiar or specific culture and language that cannot be erased by an executive order.
She further said that whatever is the administrative arrangement or mandate, DepEd NIR will continue to be united because this time, it is mandated by love and for almost two years, has stayed together.
However, the time has come for the two provinces to go back to their respective regions – Region 7 for Negros Oriental and Region 6 for Negros Occidental.
But brothers and sisters are brothers and sisters wherever they live and whoever they will report to, Briones pointed out.
She praised DepEd NIR for generating a total of P229,408,824.81 in donations during the Brigada Eskwela this year under the leadership of then Regl. Director Gilbert Sadsad and his assistant Dr. Salustiano Jimenez.
Secretary Briones also said that as promised, Batang Pinoy will continue to be hosted by Negros Oriental particularly Dumaguete City, including the National Secondary Schools Press Conference, and the Festival of Talents, as originally planned.
In a meeting with DepEd Region 7 Regl. Director Dr. Juliet Geruta, it was agreed that programs originally planned for DepEd NIR will continue including trainings of teachers, and that the turnover will be the day of the transition period itself up to the 59th day “to make it as happy, as painless, as welcoming, and as smooth as possible”.
Briones said she wants to make sure that the concern for continuing programs, physical facilities, and the movement of third level officials as well as teachers will have to be settled on the 60th day.
As early as now, Secretary Briones is toying the idea of converting the existing DepEd NIR regional office in Dumaguete as an extension, satellite or sub regional office of DepEd Region 7 where things can be consolidated and collated before taking them to Cebu, with only a few people actually having to travel across to Cebu.
According to the Secretary, Director Geruta practically agrees with the proposition “because it is the practical thing to do”. (Juancho Gallarde/PNA)