TABUK CITY, Kalinga – Amidst legal actions being undertaken against alleged corruption in the executive branch, Tabuk City Mayor Darwin C. Estrañero is appealing to all city employees to stay focused and steadfast in their duties for the common good.
“Agtrabaho tayo latta, let us continue performing our duties because our people is depending on us especially at this time of the pandemic, we need to work together in securing the borders while undertaking our office responsibilities,” he said.
He appealed especially to the frontliners to remain patient and understanding while enduring their daily ordeal specially those assigned in the health control areas or checkpoints. As recalled, there had been incidents concerning people not following protocols who lashed out at frontliners on duty who were just following instructions and some were even bashed on social media.
“I would also like to appeal to keep our frontliners out of this because they are under extreme stress everyday and they don’t need more of it every time they open Facebook,” the mayor said.
For the department heads and the local government employees, he appealed for them to back the health work force in the fight against the pandemic and to continue performing their duties despite the current political crisis within the city government resulting to alleged filling of cases against the mayor, including some officials.
The mayor surmised that his detractors had been singling him out and are using the thermal scanner issue for their own agenda.
“There is no mayor out there that has been perfect in responding to this crisis. How can there be? It’s impossible to be perfect in a problem that no one, in the whole history of Tabuk City or Kalinga, has ever faced before. Yet in the social media, they make it seem like I’m the only one making mistakes,” he lamented citing that there had been people including public officials insulting frontliners on social media when called out for not following protocol.
“But my detractors, who are supposedly doing all this bashing for the good of the citizens of Tabuk, has not said or written anything about it. So clearly, they are singling me out and whatever we do, even if it’s very positive, they will find ways to paint us in the most negative light,” he said.
Meanwhile, Tabuk City Legal Officer Atty. Arthur Kub-ao, Sr. also appealed to the public, especially the netizens, to discern the information that they are reading explaining that words, ideas and articles including news items being posted on social media could be manipulated depending on the intent of the writer or the social media account holder. By GGD