By Dolly Yasa
BACOLOD City – Mayor Evelio Leonardia issued Executive Order No. 38 declaring July 18 as “Atty. Simplicio A. Palanca Day” in Bacolod City in recognition of the businessman’s invaluable contribution and colossal impact to Bacolod’s economic landscape.
Palanca, fondly called “The Old Man By the Sea” and “The Man Who Saw Tomorrow,” passed away on July 10 and will be laid to rest on Sunday July 18.
Palanca, 98, died of a lingering illness in a hospital here Saturday
Earlier, Leonardia said “we lost an extraordinary man” with Palanca’s passing.
Leonardia said Palanca was “one of a kind”, adding that he was a man with a vision that nobody else had.
“As early as the 1960s, when our city was relatively laid-back and we were just content with what we had, Atty. Palanca had envisioned the reclamation area. Maybe many did not comprehend what he was dreaming of and how the reclamation would impact us as a city.”
He said Palanca changed the landscape of Bacolod literally and figuratively, and it is now hard to imagine Bacolod without the reclamation area.
Leonardia said that the reclamation project has helped catapult Bacolod to where it is today and if there is any single person who made a colossal impact on our progress and development, without fear of contradiction, we must give the credit to him.
“We now enjoy the ‘tomorrow’ that Uncle Sam envisioned many decades ago. Without him, Bacolod will not be what it is today.”
