It’s still six months away from the Christmas season and New Year revelry but this early, health authorities have reason to celebrate with President Rodrigo Duterte’s executive order to restrict firecracker use to community displays.
Plainly understood it means not one resident will be allowed to use firecrackers to celebrate Christmas, New Year or in the case of Cebu, Sinulog and other city centric celebrations without being sanctioned by national government agencies like the Departments of Health (DOH) and Interior and Local Governments (DILG).
And last Tuesday’s signing marked barely a year when President Duterte said he will consider a nationwide firecracker ban to stop the senseless injuries and deaths caused by irresponsible and unregulated firecracker use.
Contrary to public perception, the President’s order won’t ring in the death knell for the country’s firecrackers industry.
In fact, it may help professionalize the industry even more by allowing pyrotechnics makers to compete for staging fireworks displays during national or local holidays.
Then again, given the pervasiveness of corruption in the country, it may be another lucrative source of income for local officials that may bid out the opportunity to stage fireworks displays for a healthy bite of the profit.
That’s still another story though. What’s important is that the order explains its rationale behind confining or restricting firecrackers use to community activities and celebrations, and it’s about time the public or the Filipinos who still insist on celebrating the holidays their way by lighting up firecrackers to listen up and comply with it lest they face sanctions.
Or at least we hope that the sanctions will be sufficient enough to make firecracker fanatics seriously consider giving up their habit. Again, the order allows firecracker manufacturers to sell their products to community sanctioned events or celebrations and under the supervision of a duly trained professional licensed by the PNP.
What is being eliminated is the individual or even group use of firecrackers unless it is sanctioned by local and national government agencies.
That’s where the firecracker makers and vendors make the most profit from, as a lot of Filipinos still have to kick the nasty habit of celebrating holidays by blowing things up.
Isn’t it about time local governments and barangays heavily promote the use of community fireworks displays to eventually wean Filipinos out of that nasty habit?
New York City’s famed fireworks display at Times Square during New Year’s Eve comes to mind.
It will take time for the order to sink in, but this early some or even a lot of us should resist the temptation to light and blow up a firecracker just to celebrate a special occasion.
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