TACLOBAN CITY – Pintados Foundation President Eugene Tan lambasted the report regarding the statement of a female council member in the city during their recent session on the passage of ordinance making Sangyaw as the official festival of the city.
During the deliberation of the ordinance, he said that he “heard reports” that the money solicited by the festival organizers of a festival in the city goes directly to the pocket of some of their members.
Tan exclaimed that said accusation was absurd as the entire money that they were able to solicit from their sponsors goes directly to the organizing of Pintados Festival and if there is an excess it goes directly to the fund Pintados Foundation which they use to support some of their programs.
“All the money that we are able to solicit goes directly to the funding of the festivals which we uses mostly for the prizes of the contingent. If there is a excess the amount it goes directly to the foundation to be used for the scholarship programs of Pintados Foundation,” Tan explained.
Tan stressed that when they created the festival, its intention was not just to showcase through ritual dance presentation the life of early Taclobanons but also to help the most in need constituents of the city which are the street children who are vulnerable to sort of crimes and accidents as they roam in the streets.
Tan added that aside from sending the street children to school (elementary and secondary) they also provide them school supplies, uniforms and school fees including their other needs such as feeding programs to improved their nutritional and health conditions.
Tan revealed that since the foundation started in 1986 they were able to send a handful of street children in school where some of them were able to graduate in college.
“This is what we are, this is what we really do, not just presenting festival but helping the Taclobanons particularly the street children to be integrated back to the mainstream community in order to shape their mind up to become a good and productive citizen in this city,” Tan said.
“Though we experience obstacles through the 24 years of our existence in this city, we are able to survive because we are able to manage our organization well including our funds, because we are not here for money but to help Taclobanons, by bringing joy through festival and improve their lives through the scholarships that we grant,” he added.
Tan said that aside from the holding of Pintados Festival and programs like scholarship to street children, they were able to institutionalized some of the competitions they are hosting and make other municipalities and province in the region closer to Tacloban.
Among which is the regional inter-school cheer dance competition and the regional inter-school drums and bugle competition. (ROEL AMAZONA)
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