National Book Week

Calbayog Library holds book exhibit

By Klenn Salde Tinapay

Calbayog City – The public library here recently concluded its Book Exhibit during the National Book week celebration with the theme “Ang Aklat sa Ika-100 Taon ng Kalayaan”.

The library personnel headed by City Librarian Sofronia E. Delabajan with some government officials, employees, teachers, pupils and students gathered together for this exhibit which was aimed to promote the use of the library and its reading materials with focus on books.

Books played an important role in the history of the Filipino people and their continuing struggle for economic, political and cultural emancipation.

“The city library, together with the archive, is under the Sangguniang  Panglungsod but is being supervised by the National Library, “ Mrs. Delabajan said in an exclusive interview with this writer.

She added that the city library received 213 encyclopedias, almanacs and centennial books from the National Library, Asia Foundation and Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas this year.

The National Library, as part of its annual book allocation to the city, delivered 160 volumes of books, an average of 100 volumes yearly,” the librarian stressed.

The Asia Foundation and Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas gave 50 volumes and 3 volumes of books respectively,” she further stressed.

The Sangguniang Panglungsod,on the other hand, has a P50,000 annual allocation to the city library,” she disclosed.

But with ever increasing prices of commodities including library materials, the said amount seems to be insufficient to meet the ever increasing demand of Calbayognons for more learning.

As of October 1998, the library counted some 9,608 volumes of books but only 400 books have been reportedly distributed due to the scarcity of barangay reading centers.

(This news article appeared in The Samar Reporter dated Nov. 26 – Dec. 2, 1998, Vol. XXI, No. 48)