By Dolly Yasa
Bacolod City – The Bago City government led by Mayor Nicolas Torres feted on Monday two homegrown boxers who collected a gold and a bronze medal in their respective events in the recently concluded 31st Southeast Asian Games held in Hanoi, Vietnam.
In a ceremonial recognition rite held at the Bantayan Park, Rogen Ladon, gold medalist in the Men’s Flyweight Division; and James Palicte, bronze medalist, were also commended by the Sanggunian Panlungsod and received cash incentive of P50,000 and P30,000 respectively.
The two are the most recent addition to the list of homegrown boxers who brought pride and honor to Bago City, which is dubbed as the boxing capital of Negros Occidental.
The list also included Olympic silver medalist Onyot Velasco.
Both Ladon and Palicte were gold medalists in their respective event in the 30th Southeast Asian Games held in 2019 before the pandemic.
The ceremonial recognition was preceded by a motorcade around the city as a heroes’ welcome for the two.
Yulo said that sports will continue to be among the priority programs of the city government.
He said they will continue to hone the skills of young and aspiring boxers in the locality.
Yulo said he pays tribute to the late Bago City Mayor Manuel Torres who started the grassroots boxing program of the city to develop local boxers.
Also feted by the Bago City government Monday were the Bago City Juniors Softball League who won the championship in the recently concluded Little League Philippines National Finals Softball Tournament and the Bago City Majors Softball League (1st runner-up) and the Bago City Seniors League (2nd runner up) in the same tournament.
