Sacdalan bared the plan in a meeting with mayors and provincial board members from the municipalities of Pigcawayan, Alamada, Libungan, the governor’s hometown of Midsayap and Aleosan, which compose the PALMA Alliance.
“Before the end of this month, we will be conducting the first of our municipal visitations bringing with us a package of services through the various provincial government offices,” he said.
“These visits will coincide with the schedule of engineering works to be done on our provincial roads in the various LGUs. Aside from the infrastructure services, however, we will also be conducting a medical-dental outreach, distributing books and modern educational facilities for elementary and high schools, distributing high-value crops seedlings and livestock for livelihood, and a host of other services to our people especially in depressed barangays,” the governor said.
“I believe this can impress on our people our seriousness in implementing key priorities aimed at further improving the lives of our people,” he added.
The PALMA mayors- Herminio Roquero of Pigcawayan, Ernesto Concepcion of Alamada, and Loreto Cabaya of Aleosan who is currently the PALMA Alliance chair, met with Sacdalan to brief him on the status of PALMA’s nomination for the Gawad Galing Pook. With them were Sangguniang Panlalawigan members Cesletino Rapacon, Vicente Sorupia Jr., Romeo Araña, and Ronaldo Pader.
PALMA is one of this year’s nominees for the nationwide search for best practices in governance, in the LGU alliance category. It evolved from the Libungan-Alamada Watershed Development Council started by the late Gov. Rosario P. Diaz comprising of Libungan, Midsayap and Alamada. Former Gov. and now Vice Gov. Manny F. Piñol expanded the council in 2001 to include the two other municipalities of Pigcawayan and Aleosan and extended its concerns as well from environmental intervention to pooling of resources to effectively address infrastructure and other development requirements of each of the member LGUs.
“The experience of PALMA shows us how the cooperation of different working units in addressing a particular concern can be very effective. And this is how we plan to do things in North Cotabato,” the governor said. (Williamor A. Magbanua/MindaNews)
