Fiesta, Flood, and Fraud: A Bicol September Awakening

September in Bicol is never ordinary. It brings three inevitabilities: fiesta, floods, and fraud. It is also Maritime Safety Month, when schools like Mariners march cadets and majorettes in crisp white regalia to join civic and military parades. Preparations rise for the country’s longest-running Marian celebration the Peñafrancia Feast. Continuous rains swell rivers into danger. And in Manila, corruption scandals burst open in congressional hearings.

This year, Naga City erupted in a frenzy — parades, candlelit processions for the Peñafrancia fiesta, fiery rallies against corruption, and frantic preparations for Typhoon Ompong’s landfall. Nearly a million pilgrims thronged the city. Hymns floated over the Bicol River during the Traslación and the breathtaking fluvial procession. For a moment, faith carried the people above fear.

But shadows cut through the spectacle. The rains of September 15–16 sent floodwaters into low-lying barangays including Naga City. In Congress, ghost projects, overpriced contracts, and billions lost filled the headlines. At Plaza Rizal, citizens lit not only sang and chanted, but shouted demanding accountability from a political system that seems immune to shame.

This is Bicol’s paradox: a people of deep faith and resilience, yet trapped in the same cycle where poverty, disaster, and corruption reinforce each other. September sharpened the truth: resilience without change is not strength. It is surrender.

Systemic Rot. Is corruption just the work of a few crooks? Politicians love to peddle the “bad apples” excuse. But Bicol’s experience tells otherwise. Crumbling flood-control projects, unfinished roads, abandoned ports — all point to rot that is systemic, not incidental. Embedded in structures, governance and culture.

Here, corruption is the norm. Predictable. Pervasive. Self-reinforcing. It seeps into politics and daily life until resignation sets in. “Ganyan talaga yan, kasama na yan.” “Makisama ka na lang.” It is as systemic as poverty itself.

A Colonial Curse. The roots run deep. Spain turned public office into reward, not service. The Americans built an electoral system that favored the landed few. Marcos turned corruption into industry, normalizing impunity and dynasties that survived his downfall. Colonial habits hardened into political DNA.

Bicol as Mirror. Bicol mirrors this national malaise. Every typhoon season, homes drown while flood-control funds vanish. Every election, dynasties promise progress but deliver patronage. Every fiesta, candles drift along the river while public trust sinks beneath the surface.

The damage is not only material but moral. Corruption robs people twice: first of resources, then of faith in institutions.

Breaking the Cycle. If corruption is systemic, token reforms will not save us. Systemic rot needs systemic solutions:

Transparency by default. Budgets, contracts, and project monitoring must be open to the public, in real time.

Reclusion perpetua for plunder. Enforcement of the fullest extent of the law.

Citizen vigilance. Technology can empower communities to track projects and expose ghost roads before they collapse.

Institutional reform. Anti-dynasty laws, independent audits, stronger oversight bodies — not luxuries, but necessities.

Above all, the power structure of patronage must be dismantled. People should not be praised for “resilience” to theft and exploitation. They should be protected from it.

Awakening or Apathy? Every September, Bicol proves its capacity for devotion and endurance. But devotion must become demand. Otherwise, the cycle continues: fiestas that lift the spirit, floods that break the body, and corruption that drains the future.

Faith alone cannot rebuild roads, stop floods, or prosecute plunderers. That requires political will, citizen action, resistance to fraud and courage to demand transparency and accountability. That requires a people liberated from the shackles of their colonized past.

This September, amid hymns, floodwaters, and scandals, Bicol delivered a warning: resilience without chsnge is a trap. The real question is no longer whether Bicol can endure. It always has. The question is whether the Philippines is ready to break free — or keep surrendering September after September.