Kennon Road opens for PMA alumni homecoming on Valentine’s Day weekend

BAGUIO CITY — This year’s Phillippine Military Academy (PMA) alumni homecoming may be pushing through over Valentine’s Day weekend.

An advisory from the Cordillera Regional Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council on Sunday (Feb. 7) said Kennon Road will temporarily open for the exclusive use of active and retired military officers who will be participating in the PMA homecoming set on Feb. 12-14.

Kennon Road has been closed to all motorists, except for residents of Baguio and in neighboring Tuba because of ongoing rehabilitation projects.

Albert Mogol, RDRRMC chair and Cordillera director of the Office of Civil Defense had approved the PMA’s request and issued instructions for the famous zigzag road to be open from 6 a.m. on Feb. 12 to midnight of Feb. 13 for the use of PMA alumni driving up to Baguio.

The road will be open from 6 a.m. on Feb. 13 until midnight of Feb. 14 when they drive out of the summer capital.

The PMA has yet to release any information about their homecoming activities. The homecoming is staged each year by the PMA Alumni Association.

It is not clear if the homecoming has been cleared by local authorities given the General Community Quarantine that is being enforced in Baguio throughout February.

The staging of a muted Baguio Flower Festival this month had been reset to summer by its organizers.

The PMA has instituted a lockdown even before Luzon was placed under an Enhanced Community Quarantine in March last year, although it still proceeded with a low-key homecoming.

Mass testings in December and January showed that more than 50 cadets were infected by the coronavirus but were asymptomatic. Military instructors and kitchen staff also tested positive for Covid-19.

To protect its cadets, the PMA restricted visitors, including parents of cadets during the 2020 graduation in May. VINCENT CABREZA