Nej, Panagbenga uli next month. The hottest time to be in Baguio (barring the holidays), and every election cycle now and then, subject to the (unwanted) presence of politicians hijacking the parades to campaign for their poll hopes.
In 2019, for instance, we had certified (cosmic profanity) senatorial hopefuls Revilla, Lapid, and Marcos (I was debating whether to put “the better one” or “the worse one,” but both are in my eyes—in this Personal Opinion space—bad) joining the parades despite a standing restriction on such politicking.
(In the interest of clarity: There are many politicians I dislike and worse, but that will only ever come out in my personal column space. Assume that my default stance on any politician is, at best, neutral leaning toward negative, laden with cosmic profanity.)
Quoting an article from the Inquirer in 2019: “BFFFI stipulated in its rules that ‘no political personalities may join the Grand Parades in any form or manner, except for incumbent local officials of the city of Baguio, from the present serving congressman, mayor, vice-mayor, councilors and barangay captains, and chairpersons.’”
Given that the Panagbenga is the big thing of Baguio in terms of tourist-drawing and city-specific traditions, it is clearly a desirable advertisement space if you could finagle it. Arguably, showing up hurts your chances because people will think you are epal, but I feel it in my bones. Someone will try something. It’s just too many eyes to pass up.
And we should prevent this! We should not allow politicians who intend to profit off of their position to hijack a sacred tradition and its values of profiting off of tourist fascination and commerce.
I assume here that people who attempt such a thing will be those with ulterior motives, largely because the “good”—presenting politicians in this country have a vested interest in retaining pristine reputations. Even when it is to their ultimate detriment.
Panagbenga is a massive cultural phenomenon (in Baguio), and while us disgruntled locals would largely just deride it as yet another source of carmaggeddon, of being the same stalls over and over, of being shawarma in bloom, we cannot deny the sheer pull the festivities (somehow) have on the tourist population.
With the eyes of the people comes sheer untapped potential, sheer economy. In 2024, the parades alone drew some 52,000 people—a testament to the tenacity and ingenuity of an ungodly mass of flesh squeezing into a single district in a city designed for less people than they had—wanting to see some cool floats and flowers.
There is a beauty in that, in the public coming together to witness a few minutes of some cool arts and crafts that are increasingly corporate march down a busy thoroughfare. A certain innocence at odds with the irritation of us crammed residents.
At the very least, that little shred of innocence is already founded on the back of consumerism. Let’s not sully it more with politics.
