Inabanga equips ICoNS as information warriors

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, November 25 (PIA)—Start right, equip your men. 

That is exactly what sums up the idea of Inabanga, and former mayor Jose Jono Jumamoy makes sure this happens one at a time. 

Passionate about the idea of building capacities of their people, Jumamoy, who sits as number one councilor in his population dense town said the idea, he shares with her mother now Mayor Josephine Socorro Jumamoy. 

Ambitious as it may seem, the town leaders now see how crucial information can work to help facilitate an inclusive growth. 

For this, the ambitious formulation of a town communications team whose mission would be to facilitate the flow of information that would be a development engine in town came to shape this week starting with the Strategic Communications Training held at the Grand Luis Lodge and Convention Center November 21-22. 

At the opening message, the youthful Jumamoy shared his chance encounter with an Inabangnon now a Grab taxi driver in Manila, who communicated his longing for news from his hometown in Inabanga. 

Citing this, the young Jumamoy, who led the Inabanga Communications and News Service (ICoNS) in a two-day training stressed the need for communication both as a tool and a weapon to allow people to make smart decisions.

Inabanga is among the towns with the most economic potential with a river that supplies the lifeblood of a potentially thriving economy, keeps a treasure trove of eco-tourism wonders and a manpower that descends upon nearby growth centers for still some lack of opportunities. 

The plan is simple: make the people learn the value of sufficiency and tapping government services while allowing them to work in convergence with communities to bring out the best of them and the town, the young Jumamoy said.

There is so much that people would need to know and yet there are very few who are sharing these information, Jumamoy said meaning the local government’s initiatives at local development. 

To italicize the dire need for transparent governance, Inabanga local officials fell prey to criticisms via the social media, a move Jumamoy said could be easily avoided with transparent and accessible information. 

At the communications training, ICONS members rolled their sleeves and got into the dirty job of writing their own news stories, learning how to shoot pictures and document activities and events, prepare infographics and electronic posters and stand-alone communications collaterals, write features and had a dip at microblogging, all with the typical writeshops format which the Philippine Information Agency offers.

After the workshops, Renante Cenabre, town coastal resource management coordinator who also joined the activities said, ICoNS is now poised to get developmental information to the grass roots.

This is a service that has been among the least prioritized in most local government units, he added. 

After the trainings, he said the initial plan is to populate the local town website with information in response to transparency. 

And then we go to the online platforms, hoping to make it to mainstream channels in the future, the young Jumamoy shared. 

This, he said is the least he can do to guys like the grab taxi driver he met in Taguig.

He also hoped the move would finally get to the countless other nameless Inabangnons who have gone out of town and have heard limited information from the town. (rac/PIA-7/Bohol)