Multimillion-dollar question on Cabanatuan reports

This refers to media reports that depict the slaughterhouse run by the Cabanatuan City government as a messy, dirty and substandard enterprise, thus putting in bad light our beloved city, which for the last three years (2009 to 2011) has consistently been named by the Department of the Interior and Local Government as one of the nation’s top-performing local government units.

A “hidden hand” must be behind these reports, which are being timed with the plebiscite on the city’s bid to become a highly urbanized city (HUC) and the 2013 elections.

According to Cabanatuan City veterinarian Dr. Ricardo Bautista, out of 103 operating slaughterhouses in Central Luzon, 93 of them, including Cabanatuan’s, still practice the traditional, substandard and allegedly dirty system of “floor-dressing.” But why was the Cabanatuan slaughterhouse singled out in at least one TV show and some news reports, at a time when the city government has already approved a program for its rehabilitation and modernization, Bautista asked. That’s a multimillion-dollar question!

—PRUDENCIO E. MAGPAYO,

freelance journalist,

Cabanatuan City