Will Senate OK June 18 as Bacolod Charter Day?

Photo shows the Bacolod City Government Center situated along the Circumferential Road. The structure is popularly known as the “NGC,” or the New Government Center among Bacolodnons. WIKIMEDIA

BACOLOD City – Today, the Senate will act on the bill that seeks to amend Republic Act (RA) 7724, which declares Oct. 19 of every year as the Bacolod City Charter Day.

Rep. Greg Gasataya said this will be the third and final reading of House Bill (HB) No. 7044, which aims to declare June 18 of every year as the Bacolod City Charter Day, making it a special nonworking holiday in Negros Occidental’s capital city.

Gasataya filed the then HB No. 5875 in January upon the request of Mayor Evelio Leonardia.

After the House of Representatives passed HB No. 5875 in February, its Committee on Revision of Laws recommended House Bill No. 7044 as its substitution in Senate.

According to Leonardia, RA 7724 “created the legally unfounded belief that the Bacolod City Charter Day is on Oct. 19.”

Leonardia insisted that then president Manuel Quezon signed Commonwealth Act 326 – which officially turned Bacolod into a city – on June 18, 1938.

Gasataya affirmed this, adding that RA 7724 was only enacted “for the purpose of having the Charter Day coincide with the festivities of MassKara Festival.”

He stressed that the law “bears with it the misconception that the city was created on the day of its formal inauguration and the first assembly of the city council on Oct. 19, 1938” thus “causing several problems.”

Former mayor Monico Puentevella opposed the bill. He said Bacolod came into “corporate existence” on Oct. 19, 1938 when Quezon inaugurated the city, citing records from the National Historical Commission of the Philippines.

SOURCE: Panay News

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