New Year’s Day is a celebration that kills, at
least in many places in our country. Many innocent lives added up to the
statistics in this yearly merry-making and unrestrained revelry. For New Year’s
Eve is not only about welcoming a new figure in the calendar we call year, it
is also welcoming death in some instances. My opinion will not change though
that what we consider as “new year” is only about a celebration due to the
invention of the Gregorian calendar: that January follows December in a cycle.
It neither changes lives nor has a cosmic significance at all.
Those addicted to lighting up firecrackers
would consider it sheer luck when at the tick of the clock at 12 o’clock midnight
of January 1 up to the next few hours, the fingers are still intact. Many were
very crazy over the loud bang and the deadly explosions caused by firecrackers
that it attracted even small children. All kinds of pollution gather around, too,
the top two being air and noise. While others just enjoyed the pyrotechnics
display in the sky, many deemed it a “high” feeling to look at the cloud-level
colorful flares. For the skeptics, the big blasts will drive away evil spirits,
unmindful of the amount of money wasted and burned in the process. But real
believers use prayer as the most effective tool to ward off these evil spirits.
Today, Filipinos may be facing the worst case of
all scenarios. From counting the fingers, families will now do the headcount to
ensure not a single member of the family is missing. Irresponsible gun holders
indiscriminately fired their guns up the sky to take advantage of the noise
during New Year’s Eve. Basic science tells us that what goes up will eventually
come down. In a raging speed downward, the bullet will take away an innocent
life. The victim will be forgotten until another round of New Year’s Day
celebration. It is a vicious cycle. Nobody still learned the lesson.
What happened to a promising and bright girl Stephanie
Nicole Ella (Nicole for brevity), a victim of stray bullet on January 1, may
just be a different story this time. Those with children will be evasive about
it as they can’t take a look at the child grasping for her last breaths. That
girl as elaborated in the news had lived a happy life. She was God-fearing but
was so very young to go. The bullet that hit her did not know a name. It did
not know it was Nicole. It did know a bright future can be ruined. But that
single bullet can change the direction of this country in handling security
matters in time of joyous celebrations.
The antecedent facts would not lie. The case
of Nicole was a repeat of the many cases in the past New Year’s Day
celebrations. Those that were hit in the past cannot be helped. Those that pulled
the trigger went scot-free and made fun of justice. Those apprehended for
having fired their guns posted bail coupled with some apologetic explanations. In
most cases, nobody would take responsibility of the killings. Everybody can
yell damn it but it really happened in this country of many idiots. This is no
longer tradition, not even a mere folly of a trigger happy fellow. This is
murder in the pre-meditation that it’s new year having taken advantage of the
flash explosions everywhere.
If firing guns for nothing will not be stopped
in this kind of celebration, all must be cautiously frightened as it will still
rain more bullets from the sky. Nobody wants a tragic end but if somebody in
the family, God forbid, suddenly dropped in cold blood with bullet piercing
through the skull during the New Year’s Eve, we will know our government did
not do the best it could. As our eyes were glued to TV while the young girl Nicole
fought for her life, we care to say a prayer for this pitiful blood of the
innocent while we gnash our teeth in anguish and in bestial ferocity for the
killer.
It is high time therefore that the use of firecrackers
should be banned all over the country. This is not a true Filipino tradition
anyway. There are many ways to help the firecrackers industry but nobody can
bring back the many lives that were senselessly lost due to explosions and
stray bullets. In Davao City, it can be very easy to spot someone who fires a
gun, notwithstanding the noise around. The noise of a gun bears the semblance
of an explosion of a firecracker. The no-nonsense campaign to pin down
violators of our ordinance could hit the bulls-eye to track down irresponsible
gun holders, too. Let us not abandon the hope of the young Nicole. Let
firecrackers be banned in this country.
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