Sita Sala, 62, a mother of nine, is one of the volunteers cooking food for the soldiers and police officers securing San Fernando town in southern Cebu.| Rosalie O. Abatayo
SAN FERNANDO, Cebu — While men in uniform go around the town to keep it safe, a group of cheerful women also took the challenge of keeping their tummies full.
Armed with ladles, 15 women from different barangays in San Fernando town take turns in cooking to make sure that all police and military personnel who are serving in the elections get enough food and nutrients.
CDN Digital team encountered some of these women while they were preparing lunch packs of fried chicken and ground pork for the police personnel at noon on election day, May 13.
Among them is 62-year-old Sita Sala, a mother of nine.
Sala, in an interview, told CDN Digital that she volunteered to cook for the soldiers and the police as her form of service during the elections.
Sala started cooking for the security personnel right after she had cast her vote at the South Poblacion Elementary School at 6 a.m. on Monday.
This is the first time that Sala cooked at the make-shift kitchen in front of the police station.
Read more: Police, soldiers to secure San Fernando’s hinterland barangays on election day
“Voluntary lang gyud ning amoa. Malipay man pod mi nga makatabang mi nila,” said the Sala who takes odd jobs to make a living now that she is a senior citizen.
(This is a voluntary job. I am happy to help them.)
Read more: Election watchlist: PRO-7 mulls putting Cebu towns of San Fernando, Tuburan under red category
While previous incidents of violence have resulted to the town being placed under the orange category of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) Election Watchlist Areas (EWAs), Sala said cooking for the men who strived to keep the peace in the town was the least service they could offer./dbs