NegOr mourns death of board member

FILE: Efforts to resuscitate Umbac failed and he was rushed to the Panay hospital where he was pronounced dead by the attending physician. (Photo: Long Thiên, Flickr/Public domain)

DUMAGUETE CITY – The provincial government of Negros Oriental is mourning the death of one of its best legislators, Atty. Arturo Umbac, who met his untimely death while on an official trip to Aklan on Thursday.

Umbac was with Acting Gov. Edward Mark Macias and some board members to learn from the experience of Aklan in its ISO (international standards organization) accreditation.

Macias confirmed that the 84-year-old board member collapsed while they were touring the mangroves site of Aklan, which is one the best in the country.

Efforts to resuscitate Umbac failed and he was rushed to the Panay hospital where he was pronounced dead by the attending physician.

Board Member Nilo Sayson said Umbac was a great loss on their part, both in politics and as a private person.

Umbac was well versed and very effective in lawmaking but was also a very good general manager of the Negros Oriental II Electric Cooperative (NORECO 2) who was responsible to energize the whole province back in the 1990s.

Sayson said he could attest to the character of Umbac as general manager of the cooperative, being  the head of the education and training department with no record of corruption.

Umbac was retired by the board at age 60 despite the national policy retirement age set at 65.

He was a board member from 2004 to 2007, ran but lost for mayor of Dumaguete and staged a comeback in 2016 as a board member.

One of his very notable accomplishments as provincial legislator is the ordinance establishing the Barangay Agricultural Development Center (BADC), which was adjudged as a “Galing Pook” awardee nationwide.

Another is the walking blood donors’ ordinance that requires all the 557 barangays of the province to keep a list of walking blood donors to be used during emergency situations, among other ordinances.

Umbac was also brigade commander of the ready reserve battalion of the province and a member of the national board of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines.

Sayson said Umbac had a good sense of humor, was a good writer that made him a very effective legislator.