by Lemuel Pagliawan
Catarman N.Samar–The monthlong celebration of Northern Samar’s Ibabao Festival this year was launched last May 19 in the provincial capital of Catarman, Northern Samar highlighting a float parade representing all of the province’s 24 municipalities.
Jhon Allen Berbon, this year’s provincial Ibabao Festival coordinator, said this 2nd year of Ibabao Festival coincides with the province’s 59th founding anniversary.
As part of the many preparations, the provincial government has lined up a series of exciting events that will showcase the province’s rich history, tourism and cultural heritage.
In a separate interview, Gov. Edwin Ongchuan said that through this festival they hope to foster cultural awareness, engender deeper appreciation of the history, cultural heritage and development of Northern Samar.
He added that events like this could also somehow instill pride, integrity, nderstanding and unity among the present and future generations of Norte Samarnons.
According to him, this will appear possible with the support and participation of all the 24 component municipalities of Northern Samar which was made visible during the float parade wherein all municipalities showcased their own respective artistic and symbolic floats depicting the culture, history and livelihood sources in each town.
For his part, Berbon said all these achievements of the province at the moment could be credited to the visionary and action-directed leadership of Gov. Ongchuan.
Berbon claimed the province of Northern Samar is now a first class province, a huge leap from formerly belonging to the bottom 20 poorest provinces in the whole country.
Berbon also boasts that the peace and order situation in the province has already significantly improved.
“We are no longer the last bastion of insurgency, but already insurgency-free as proclaimed by authorities,” said Berbon.
To note, the first windmill project in the province saw its groundbreaking in the town of San Isidro- formerly a hotbed of insurgency in the province.
“In fact we intend to make this Ibabao Festival popular enough so to attract more visitors to visit the province, thereby, effect to.more economic activites in our place, ” Berbon said.
He aaid they also see the possibility of opening their doors to other places in the region to someday participate in the Ibabao Festival as well.
This year’s Float Parade contest winner is Lope de Vega town with a prize of P350,000; followed by San Roque with a prize of P250, 000; third prize went to thw municipality of Pambujan with a prize of P150,000. All other non winning participants each reveived P50,000 as consolation prize.
Accordingly, “Ibabao” is a term used in pre-Hispanic times to separate Samar Island’s northeastern region from the western coast of the island.