Tolentino salutes LGUs over education, health initiatives
RECOGNIZING their important role in the everyday lives of its citizens, Senator Francis “Tol” Tolentino, tipped his hat to the local government units (LGUs) in their initiatives to improve education and health situations and undertake crisis management in their localities.
“If the world is flat, according to book author Thomas L. Friedman, for me, the world is local, everything is local,” Sen. Tolentino pondered after he interviewed his guests in his Saturday radio program in DZRH.
He interviewed Mayor Alfredo Coro of Del Carmen, Surigao del Norte, whose initiative to make their community-based health program more responsive and efficient during health crises and calamities received the 2023 Galing Pook Award, Seal of Health Governance.
Mayor Coro shared that because of the established community-based health program, they were able to mitigate the effects of Category 4 Typhoon Odette when it pummeled their town in December 2021 and efficiently handled the response to the COVID-19 19 pandemic.
In the same radio program, Overseas Workers Welfare Administration Administrator Arnel Ignacio updated the lawmaker regarding the ongoing repatriation of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) killed in the Middle East and Gaza and assistance to those trapped in the war between Israel and Hamas.
Sen. Tolentino lauded the initiatives of local government officials who talked to the families of killed OFWs, such as the governor of Negros Occidental.
In providing education to their constituents, the lawmaker was one of the local chief executives who initiated the establishment of the locally-funded colleges and universities when he founded the Tagaytay City College in 2002 when he was the mayor.
Sen. Tolentino said the number of local colleges and universities when he founded the Tagaytay City College was about 100, and it has grown to 134 at present.
Dr. Raymundo P. Arcega, president of the Association of Local Colleges and Universities, also shared in the radio program the importance of the locally-funded tertiary institutions that respond to the needs of the localities.
Dr. Arcega said local colleges and universities are now performing at par with state colleges and universities that the national government funds by topping licensure examinations.
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