Babasa said “my administration has helped the Department of Education (DepEd) in improving quality education by hiring 120 locally paid teachers and allocated some P3.7 million from 2010 to present for their salaries and wages.”
The municipal has also given agriculture a top priority to help the farmers uplift their standard of living and address unemployment problem, the chief executive said.
Poverty incidence of this town has significantly decreased from 58.24% in 2008 to 43.45% in 2012, Babasa reported.
Babasa delivered his message in the dialect (Cebuano) so that the audience could fully understand his administration’s accomplishments.
Meanwhile, Zamboanga del Sur Governor Antonio Cerilles lauded Mayor Babasa for holding his first SOMA saying that “it is very seldom for a local chief executives to hold such as this in their respective municipality.”
“I hope that Bayog will continue to support the clean, honest, transparent and dynamic leadership to attain a better tomorrow,” Cerilles exhorted.
Also present during the event were Regional Directors Malcom Garma of the Department of Education (DepED)-9, Noemi B. Edaga of the Philippine Information Agency (PIA)-9, Provincial Director Verner Virgilio C. Jayme of the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), municipal and barangay officials, businessmen, teachers and students of the JH Cerilles State College- Bayog campus.