Panglao optimistic with new
Travel rules, Balik Bohol sale

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, March 5, (PIA) – A day before Governor Arthur Yap issued Executive Order No 17 which removed the medical clearance certificate and police issued travel authority as well as the imposition of repeat testing in Bohol, Panglao Mayor Leonila Montero reports encouraging numbers.

Feeling optimistic with the result of “Balik sa Bohol Online sale” which ran from February 21 to March 14 and with the loosening up of the travel requirements and protocols in the new normal, Montero said Panglaoanons greet the news with excitement.

Congratulations for Balik sa Bohol marketing initiative, with this, we are confident that this jumpstarts tourism again, she said during the online sale launching.

A town that hosts Bohol’s prime tourist amenities and beaches comparable to the best in the world, Panglao has slowly picked on tourism as a major industry, with thousands of residents engaged in tourism and its countless support activities.

Everything however went awry when the government imposed travel restrictions due to efforts to contain and prevent the further spread of the disease that has toppled world economies.

Thousands of Panglao residents suddenly found themselves jobless, and desperately looked for alternative incomes, even as the town attempted to reopen its businesses for domestic Boholano tourists in July of 2021.

“We were in the new normal as early as June 21, 202, when the Modified General Community Quarantine was hoisted over Bohol,” Montero told Network Briefing host JV Arcena.

But we found it difficult to get local tourists coming because of the provincial measures on closing town borders, she continued on national radio.

Panglao however is not new to climbing over its obstacles.

Having survived the millennium bug scare and Dos Palmas incident, Panglao, through Mayor Montero assured local leaders that they will manage this COVID, because we can, Montero assured.

Recently, Bohol Governor Arthur Yap issued Executive Order No. 17, series of 2021 which implements a resolution from the Inter Agency Task Force on the management of Emerging Infectious Disease (ATF EID) removing travel requirements to motivate people to travel to help revive the economy and perk up, especially the local tourism industry.

“From less than 100 a day, we are now between 200 to 300 tourist arrivals a day,” Mayor Montero updated the Boholanos and Filipinos tuned to the Network Briefing March 4, 2021 and aired live over Radyo Pilipinas and government information media sites.

For tourists now, with the EO, a tourist would only need to show a negative for COVID test result in a Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction Test (RT-PCR) in a test taken 72 hours prior to departure for Bohol and a Certificate of Acceptance once they register online as tourists.

We are asking for Acceptance to help us regulate the tourists and to issue them the necessary Quick Response Code they would need for an efficient contact tracing, Montero added.

On this, the mayor said, Panglaoanons can come home now, we are ready and we assure you that we are ready to have you, stressed Montero who just led another successful round of the 7th Panglao Tourism Summit this week. (rahchiu/PIA-7/Bohol)

WE ARE READY. Panglao mayor Leonila Montero believes, with the figures coming out now, Bohol’s new normal marketing initiatives coupled with a lifting of the travel restrictions would jumpstart the tourism economy in Panglao which stuttered when the government closed Bohol for tourists to help curb the spread of the COVID here. (rahchiu/PIABohol files)

A local tourist basks in the setting sun having Bellevue’s infinity pool by herself as Panglao is starting to believe that soon, the tourists would be back and the industry would restart in the new normal. (rahchiu/PIA-7/Bohol)