Garbage in, garbage out

IF irony had a landfill, Cagayan de Oro’s new garbage contractor, Standard Systems, would have just dumped the first load.

On its grand debut as the city’s newest waste management savior, Standard Systems managed to prove that trash collection is, indeed, an art — an abstract one. 

Within 24 hours, its shiny new fleet was already making headlines: one truck crashed, another couldn’t fit through the city’s narrow streets, and a third — the star of the show — reportedly lacked an OR-CR. Because what better way to haul garbage than with an unregistered vehicle?

This, of course, from the same administration that promised a “qualified service provider to collect, haul, and dispose of municipal solid waste and perform street sweeping across all 80 barangays,” as the Bids and Awards Committee proudly stated. 

The City Local Environment and Natural Resources Office even assured us that “this contract seeks to maintain the city’s cleanliness, safeguard public health, and minimize environmental hazards.”

Maybe they meant emotional hazards, because residents are certainly feeling trash trauma now.

The Terms of Reference (TOR) also required that “all trucks must have LTO registration, GPS, warning devices, sound systems, and proper markings.” 

It’s hard to miss the poetry there — a registered truck requirement for a contractor whose truck can’t even pass an LTO checkpoint. 

Perhaps the missing registration is part of a “minimalist” compliance strategy.

Then there’s the matter of those 10-wheeler dump trucks. According to the TOR, Standard Systems must field “20 units of 10-wheeler dump trucks (22 cubic meters)” to serve the city. 

A noble idea, if Kagay-an’s inner barangays weren’t built like a maze for matchbox cars. Watching a 10-wheeler attempt a U-turn in Macasandig or Lapasan is like watching a whale try to swim in a kiddie pool — majestic, but tragic.

And the pièce de résistance? The accidents. Multiple, on day one. Because nothing says “operational readiness” like trash trucks colliding with parked cars before they even reach the dump. You can almost hear the city’s P90-million project budget whisper, “I told you so.”

Still, let’s be fair. Maybe it’s all part of the plan — a high-stakes performance art piece titled “The Hauling of Accountability.” 

After all, the TOR warns that “violations such as missed collection schedules, uncovered trucks, or unclean vehicles incur P5,000 per day per violation.” 

By that measure, the city might finally earn something back from this contract — in penalties.

Meanwhile, Kagay-anons, who were promised “daily garbage collection and street sweeping citywide” and a minimum of “315 tons per day” of trash cleared, now find themselves tiptoeing around plastic mountains, wondering if they should just rent their own tricabs to finish the job.

Kagay-an didn’t want much — just clean streets and working trucks. What it got instead was a crash course in how not to run a waste management system. 

But hey, at least the garbage isn’t lonely. 

It’s got plenty of company now — bureaucracy, incompetence, and a few dented parked cars.

Because here in the City of Golden Friendship, even the trash gets a warm welcome.

Goodbye, George

“In the fear and alarm, you did not desert me, my brother in arms.” ― Dire Straits, Brothers in Arms [1985]

 I LOST a dear friend. George Bagsic, one of the popular folksingers in the city died of cardiac arrest on Friday night.

 He told me his family was into folk music in Olongapo. His partner, who had since become his intimate partner, is a resident here. He relocated here in Cagayan de Oro after a contracted gig in South Korea.

 We first met under competitive circumstances. There was an acoustic playing contest in Butuan City and I enlisted as a contestant. He wasn’t but I was determined to outplay him — in musician’s lingo — lagyan. But he rose to the challenge. He also played his best piece.

 Weeks later, I saw him fetching water in our neighborhood communal faucet. We were both surprised that we were neighbors. From then on our friendship flourished. He became my brother from another mother.

 I remember that time when we broke in my brand new component. We used an LCD projector and enjoyed a concert like we were there by sitting on the floor, with a picnic like banig with a bottle of rum, ice, and two glasses.

 The skill he taught me with the guitar will his legacy to me. I remember he taught me one particularly difficult A chord structure — A major 9th dominant +13. He also taught me the creative phraseology of certain melodies.

 His last text message to me was on March 16. It was a memo for the performers at a resto-bar he was playing at.

 “Please be advised that our acoustic (performances) will be suspended…starting tomorrow March 17, 2020. Wait for further notice (when) to resume,” the memo reads.

 He was anxious because he lived from gig to gig. He had no day job like I had when I used to “lagare” the local bars with him before. Music was literally his bread and butter.

BURGOS STREET MUSIC COLLECTIVE

 With the bars in Cagayan de Oro closing as part of the preventive measures in containing the contagion, he was clearly in dire straits. He was at his wit’s end as to where to get the money to buy their next meal. His heart gave out.

 When I replied with a sad emoticon to his text message, he replied with a smiling emoticon with a halo. Rest easy, my dear friend. You will be missed.

Flygate Kagay-anons

CAGAYAN de Oro has lately found itself riding a wave of stomach-related illnesses sloshing through urban neighborhoods.

🎶 Whoo…hoy! Ayaw pagbalod. 🎶

A mass movement unlike the one the city saw last Sunday — this time of the bowel variety.

In other words, business as usual in a country where diarrhea is still treated less like a public health failure and more like a natural disaster.

The fascinating bit isn’t the outbreak itself, but the collective yawn outside Northern Mindanao. Even social media — that great amplifier of idiotic outrage — has barely burped.

If this were happening in NCR or Baguio, you’d expect hourly updates, DOH briefings with infographics, maybe even a temporary water-rationing scandal. At the very least, a “WALANG PASOK” banner on Facebook daily.

But because it’s “just” Cagayan de Oro…

🎶 Krik…krik…krik 🎶

Same old story: disasters in Mindanao are tragedies only to Mindanaoans. 

A cholera scare in BGC would be a national emergency; in Kagay-an it’s a quirky footnote, filed between #sanaolCarmen and a multi-million boulevard closed to traffic.

That shrug should worry everyone. 

Waterborne diseases don’t check plane or bus tickets before traveling. Today it’s Kagay-an; tomorrow, your city’s tap.

Still, as long as the problem stays “down south,” the rest of the archipelago acts immune.

Enough self-pity. We are, after all, the e-gateway to Northern Mindanao [pun intended]. We are the new ‘flygates.’

Here’s a modern civic trick: people get sick, officials point at “contaminated water,” and then perform the ritual dance — tests, press releases, reassurances.

Right now, the City Health Office has sent samples to DOH-10, restaurants have quietly stopped serving free water and ice, and everyone is waiting to see what’s what.

But if you want to know why your stomach is playing percussion, just step outside: look at the sidewalks, the Cagayan River, and the perennially flooded highway in the ironically named Barangay Kauswagan.

For months, residents have posted photos of uncollected garbage while officials wrestle with a contractor that can’t (or won’t) collect on schedule. The city council is even mulling giving every barangay its own garbage truck because the current system is collapsing.

And here’s why that matters: garbage isn’t just ugly, it’s a five-star hotel for bacteria, flies, and rats. It clogs drains. It floats. It seeps into shallow wells and roof tanks.

Then the rains come — during the “ber months” — and all that trash turns into a mobile contamination unit, delivered by floodwater straight into where we keep our drinking water.

That’s not speculation; that’s human behavior plus government neglect.

We’ve already seen flash floods this year that stranded people and swept away cars. Combine that with months of festering trash and you’ve got a recipe: pathogens hitch a ride on floodwater into homes and cisterns.

People drink, get sick. The Cagayan de Oro Water District insists its supply is safe. Restaurants stop serving tap. The health office wipes its hands.

Yes, COWD says its pipelines tested negative. But that doesn’t answer the tank-in-your-yard question, nor does it stop restaurants and households from treating tap water like poison.

That’s the uncomfortable theater: a clean central supply can still be sabotaged by roof tanks caked with bird poop or by streets so jammed with garbage they turn into septic rivers with every downpour.

Complaints about garbage aren’t just about bad selfies — they’re the city’s early warning system for the next health crisis.

So what should happen, besides the obligatory press conferences and “we’re investigating” FB posts?

Start with the obvious and unsexy: enforce collection schedules. Audit and, if necessary, fire useless contractors.

Oh wait — we didn’t even bid out a new contract until the old one expired. Only then did the city scramble for a new schmuck.

Meanwhile, inspect restaurants and building tanks. If they’re testing positive, fix them — instead of wedding old couples in the hinterlands.

Yes, people will bitch and moan about budget lines and tender processes. But the alternative is getting used to waves of gastrointestinal misery.

So to the water district, city hall, and contractor: congratulations! #wootwoot 

You’ve cleared stage one of this civic drama — denial and testing. 

The hard part is stage two: accountability and action.

If Cagayan de Oro really wants to live up to its “City of Golden Friendship” brand, maybe start by making sure visitors aren’t greeted by floating trash.

And if you’re a resident with a roof tank: for the love of chlorine, clean it. 

Kagay-an can’t save you if you’re swimming in last month’s garbage and calling it “communal compost.”

The ber months are coming. They don’t care who’s in charge. Pfft