In Urbiztondo, a wedding and a wake

URBIZTONDO, Pangasinan—It was planned to be a grand double wedding ceremony at

St. Pius V Parish Church here.

Mayor Ernesto Balolong Jr. and his wife Mirla, president of the Liga ng mga Barangay federation, were to renew their vows on their silver wedding anniversary, while their eldest son, Councilor Volter Balolong, would exchange vows with his fiancée, Angela Arce.

On Sunday afternoon, only Volter and his bride knelt before the altar in a simple and somber rite.

The previous day, Balolong was felled by assassins’ bullets while he inspected the venue of the wedding reception just across his house here.

“It must be a very difficult situation for the family now because they are also mourning,” said Fr. Antonio Ray Quintans, parish priest.

Volter, 24, said he had to push through with his wedding because it was his father’s wish that no matter what happened, the wedding should take place.

On Monday, police filed murder and attempted murder cases against the suspects in the mayor’s killing—Eduardo de Guzman, 65, and Marito Sarmiento, 38— in the provincial prosecutor’s office in San Carlos City.

De Guzman and Sarmiento were arrested in Barangay Salomague Sur in Bugallon town on Saturday afternoon after witnesses identified them as the two men who had alighted from a Toyota Innova car and shot Balolong.

The mayor’s police security detail, PO1 Eliseo Ulanday, and supermarket electrician Edmund Meneses also died during the shooting.

Wounded were Balolong’s aide, Rex Ferrer, 52; Jose Vigilia, 18, and Jimboy Palisoc, 19, both supermarket employees; and Rogelio Esguerra, 46, a taho (soy drink) vendor.

Also on Monday, Mayor Noel Nacar of Dasol town, president of the League of Municipalities of the Philippines chapter in Pangasinan, urged the police to identify who was behind the crime and reminded them not to let the case go the way of the 2012 murder of Mayor Ruperto Martinez of Infanta town, also in Pangasinan.

On Sunday, Councilor Balolong, who was dressed in  pink long-sleeved shirt and white pants, arrived in the dimly lit church here at 3:15 p.m. as heavy rains poured. He was escorted by policemen and relatives.

While sitting on the front pew waiting for the priest, he hugged an aunt and sobbed.

The bride came in with her parents at 3:21 p.m. She wore a sleeveless white blouse and a mint green skirt.

When the wedding ceremony began at 4:09 p.m., the couple walked and sat on a pair of bare wooden chairs facing the altar. No bridal march, no maids of honor, no flower girls and ring bearers, not even floral decorations.

The widow, who was in green blouse and black pants, sat silently with Pangasinan Rep. Mark Cojuangco, one of the principal sponsors, at the right side of the altar behind the couple. “This is the saddest wedding I have attended in my life,” said Cojuangco, who arrived with Vice President Jejomar Binay.

Binay had dropped by the wake before going to the church to greet the couple. He left before the wedding Mass began.

“This is supposed to be a happy day for them, but it is filled with grief. I cannot even express how I feel right now. Anger, sadness,” Cojuangco said.