Rio and Cebu: Convergence and divergence
Both are metropolitan areas by world standards today. Both were founded as cities in 1565 by colonial powers partitioning the world unto themselves in search of gold and spices. One already has a mass transit system, the other is poised to make one. Both have old town centers that contain remnants of the colonial past. Both have a huge problem with urban poverty amid scandalous wealth of the few. The cities of Cebu and Rio de Janeiro do share a lot of things in common.
Beyond these commonalities, however, are palpable divergences that have put the fate of these two cities far apart. Even by the standard of those Havaianas slippers. Only the rich can wear them in Cebu while the poor here in Rio de Janeiro sport many of these as they romp around the beaches of Ipanema and Copacabana. And while the wealthy look down from their multi-million peso houses on hills overlooking Cebu City, their counterparts live on what locals here call the “asphaltos,” flat coastal areas paved with cement and asphalt. Rio de Janeiro’s poor, on the other hand, live dangerously on granite hillsides called “morros” or the derogatory “favelas”, named after a plant that once grew where these tiny houses have now sprouted.
On another thought, Cebu was devastated by World War II, Rio and the rest of this hemisphere on earth was spared of the bombings and the tremendous loss of human resources.
Still, there are lessons to be learned, however, with the way the city of Rio has dealt with the difficulties of life in the present-day reality of urban poor settlements. Cebu and other cities in the Philippines can probably learn from this experience. A tour of the old town last Sunday brought me out of the classy enclave where organizers have billeted us during the international museum conference that I attended for eight days here. On the hour-long bus ride to the old colonial quarter of the city, I passed through some of the depressing and dreadful sections where the poor come down from the adjacent morros to eke out lives and where drug lords still probably rule the day. Full of graffiti, garbage strewn around and reeking of urine, one can sense nonetheless that the city is tackling poverty head on.
Along the way, I could see cable cars linking some of these favelas or morros to the downtown area. Once you see these cable cars, you will know that the particular hillside settlement has been freed from the clutches of drug lords and are well on the way to peaceful coexistence with the rest of the city. Rio had to resort to a show of force, organizing incorruptible elite police units of men and women that literally lived and worked in the favelas to clear these of criminals and drug lords. The two push factors that helped are: the FIFA World Cup next year and the Summer Olympics in 2016. Rio must be safe for the expected invading force of millions that will briefly stay in this city of over 6 million during these two events.
Already, Rio has gotten the nod last year of the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) which cited a section of the city as a World Heritage Site under the category of cultural landscape. Historical markers have sprouted all over this section and even the city’s street names carry explanatory biographies of the particular person on which the street is named after.
If there is one internationally significant event that should compel Cebu City to behave in the way of Rio, it might as well be the International Eucharistic Congress in 2016, and something which gives it more time to work on, the 500th anniversary of the Magellan landing in 2021. I am sure that, if the city does its homework now, it shall get a World Heritage Nomination perhaps by 2018 and, who knows, the Unesco nod in time for 2021. And then we might end up like Rio with its 120 museums, countless number of parks and greeneries, compared to the 14 museums and a handful of parks in Cebu City.
Of course, Rio was the capital of Brazil until 1960–which gave it much more cosmopolitan power and prowess in developing as a cultural and economic center than Cebu which was the capital of tiny Filipinas from 1565 to 1567 only. And while the Bus Rapid Transit (its English equivalent is Rapid Transit Bus) has fully developed now in Rio, Cebu still relies on the largesse of Malacañang to lay this out come hell or high water, with some, not all, jeepney drivers soon to lose their livelihood.
But 2016, when the largest number of Catholic officials and clerics swoop down on Cebu, is just around the corner. And I am sure Mayor Michael Rama is not going to embarrass Cebuanos who will always go out of their way to clean up, show its best face and welcome visitors with open arms. Beyond the need for a mass transit system and the drainage issues that are now being addressed, is the question of how to engage the urban poor to make them less as locales of crime and illegal drugs. It is here where the lessons from Rio’s decision to create an elite, incorruptible police unit might come in handy.
