Celebrating anniversaries mentally transports us back to how things – milestones, relationships, events and others – started. It is in remembering the past that we are made more aware of our reason for being at present and enable us to choose the better direction as we move forward.
This season of the year is one such occasion for celebration and remembering as we marked on Nov. 11 the 23rd anniversary of NEGROS WEEKLY and the third year of its offspring publication, NEGROS NOW DAILY and its online edition.
I had been blessed to serve an active part in the beginnings of six news organizations based in Bacolod City. The number could more than double if I include in the count the school papers I helped establish and organize all over the province as well as in various regions of the country – as a journalism educator and trainor for nearly five decades.
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Forty-one years ago, a couple of years after earning my Master of Science in Journalism degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, I sat as the first editor-in-chief of the VISAYAN DAILY STAR. My EIC position came following the one-month old interim editor’s post.
The interim position, held by the late Primo Esleyer, one of the VDS founders, was designated as the VDS Board was still in search of an EIC.
It was a privilege to be part of the VDS team, led by President Ninfa Leonardia, Esleyer, Modesto Sa-onoy, Rolando Espina and other media veterans as we steered the paper to become the No. 1 daily in the island and be recognized nationally and internationally by news agencies which relied on VDS writers for their news stories on events and developments in Negros island.
Negros news reports were banner stories even abroad at that time, when the island was in the eye of the storms of insurgency, sugar crisis and related issues, like malnutrition, social unrest and dwindling economy.
I would like to think that no other decade in recent memory surpassed the newsworthiness of Negros than the Eighties, thereby catapulting the DAILY STAR to its prime until it lost its twinkle starting the pre-pandemic days.
My DAILY STAR work all in all lasted for over two decades when I was invited back to serve as editor of STARLIFE, the midweek and weekend features section of the DAILY STAR.
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My professional life was devoted to academic and university work after my early VDS days until another opportunity came. Sir Mode Sa-onoy was planning to open his own newspaper business and while in a public gathering, he asked me of a possible name of the publication – something which emphasizes time, like TODAY.
Knowing his influence and acumen in the shaping of public opinion, I casually suggested, “Why not TODAY News-Views?” The name stuck and a few months later in 1989, the paper was born. Its initial staff was led by my former Journalism student Eric Loretizo (now deceased), who had just completed his BS Mass Communication major in Journalism course.
Recognizing the need for greater editorial experience for the paper to be more competitive, Sir Mode invited me months later to head the editorial team.
Eventually, the paper became SUN.STAR Bacolod, a part of the Cebu-based SUN.STAR Network. I stayed with the publication for about four years, a job I held while also still teaching in the university.
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In the early months of 2000, a group of development-oriented businessmen in northern Negros approached me for help in their plan to start a weekly news-magazine that would augur industry growth in the area.
The group wanted me to frame the editorial policies and organize the staff as the editorial consultant. Thus, NEGROS WEEKLY was born. We extended the invitation to Nida Buenafe, fresh from her PANAY NEWS stint, to serve as the editor of the new weekly.
After about 12 years, she turned over the position to Dolores Epacta-Miranda, who was then handling the business operations of the paper as Nida devoted her time to her sports editorship in the DAILY STAR. Both ladies are graduates of the Recoletos Mass Communication program, which I previously headed.
Dolores was elected president of NEGROS Press Club in 2015, a development we considered as a manifestation of the recognition of the role played by NEGROS WEEKLY in the local media industry.
I served NW as president and NOW DAILY, upon its establishment in 2020 as executive editor until I suffered from stroke in the first quarter of 2021.
Today, Gilbert Bayoran, a DAILY STAR colleague and my former UNO-R student, sits as NW president with Nida as corporate secretary and Dolores as treasurer.
With us in the board is Jade Marquez, also a UNO-R Mass Communication alumna.
Nida heads the NOW DAILY operations as editorial director with Cheryl Cruz, another VDS co-worker before, as executive editor; Gilbert as managing editor and Dolores as marketing director.
I also acknowledge the enduring service – from our DAILY STAR days to our NW operations – of Roger Beltran, our layout artist, who has been providing us with creatively-done covers and page designs.
Thanks, too, to our reliable office messenger-all around guys Richard Dela Cruz and Allan Leonardo as well as our utility staff, Trinidad Andoy, for helping in making our daily routines always going.
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Not many are privileged and blessed to sow and nurture the seeds of journalism education and media practice.
My pioneering days with the Daily Star, Today News-Views, Sun.Star Bacolod, Negros Weekly as well as Negros Now Daily and its online edition – these are life-time blessings and privileges that will always be cherished. For these opportunities, I am most thankful to God for making me a channel in delivering messages that help people make rational decisions in their lives and, in the process, etch a difference in society.
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I am just as blessed today in my related endeavor – sharing God’s word daily through the social media, a ministry I have been led to after I asked the Lord for me to further use my communication knowhow in spreading His message of love, faith, hope and salvation.
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He has filled them with skill to do all kinds of work as engravers, designers, embroiderers in blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen, and weavers—all of them skilled workers and designers. (Exodus 35:35) | NWI
