PORAC, PAMPANGA — An Aeta elementary school student, who had appealed to President Macapagal-Arroyo in June to give her village a school, met the President again on Tuesday this time with tears in her eyes.

Tears of joy, that is.

Joan Duya, 14, a fifth grader, wept after her plea was answered with the start of construction of a two-classroom school building in the remote village of Diaz here.

Duya told Ms Arroyo the school would end their hours of having to walk from Diaz to the nearest school, the Villa Maria Elementary School in Barangay Villa Maria, about a two-hour hike away.

“It would be the first school here. Soon we will not have to walk for hours just to attend our classes,” said Duya in Kapampangan.

Children at Barangay Diaz leave their homes before sunrise to catch their 7 a.m. class at VMES. Most of them stay with relatives in Barangay Villa Maria during school days and return to Diaz on Friday afternoon.

Wish come true

“I am very happy that President Arroyo made my wish come true,” Duya said.

The President hugged Duya as the latter tried to hide her tears.

“This is a remarkable day for me since one of the school-less villages in the country will soon have a school building,” Ms Arroyo said.

Education Secretary Jesli Lapus said the school, which is expected to be completed by December, would follow a multi-level type of learning where a small number of students are merged into a class.

Around 15 first grade students and 12 second graders are expected to study there.

Ms Arroyo asked Lapus to look for another teacher who could teach Grades 3 and 4, apart from the teacher assigned to the village.

She told the Aeta residents that one of the classrooms would first be used as a health center. She also promised to bring electricity to their village soon.

Barangay Diaz was the last of six Aeta communities in Porac Ms Arroyo visited. The others were Villa Maria, Sapang Uwak, Camias, Inararo and Katutubo.

The village is accessible only to four-wheel drive vehicles because of its rugged roads.

Village chief Dionisio Guiao said around 300 Aetas live there.

“Not one of us owns a four-wheel drive here so when we want to go to the town proper we have to walk for two hours,” Guiao said, adding that they go to the public market in groups once a week to buy food.

In Pangasinan, where Ms Arroyo proceeded after Pampanga, an unscheduled power interruption prevented her from delivering a speech shortly after she inaugurated the P31-million Arenas Civic Center in Malasiqui.

Ms Arroyo, who was accompanied by Pangasinan Rep. Ma. Rachel Arenas and her mother, Rose Marie “Baby” Arenas, was on stage when the power was cut.

“It was not intentional,” said Concepcion Curameng, manager of the Central Pangasinan Electric Cooperative member services division.

After the ceremony, Ms Arroyo was briefed on the status of the Agno River earth dikes, which were breached during the onslaught of Tropical Storm “Pepeng.” Charlene Cayabyab, Inquirer Central Luzon, and Gabriel Cardinoza, Inquirer Northern Luzon