Imelda plans cable car to memorial

Former First Lady Imelda Marcos has decided to set up a cable car system on a mountaintop to allow visitors access and a grand view of the proposed burial site of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos in Ilocos Norte, northern Luzon.

Imelda proposed the idea of installing cable cars to provide visitors access to the area, said Batac Mayor Jesus Nalupta.

She had inspected the mountain ranges of Payao village on her earlier visits to Ilocos Norte, noted Nalupta, hinting that the area has been chosen as the proposed burial site of the ex-dictator.

"We were told that the area was chosen as a possible burial site of the late President Marcos," the Philippine Daily Inquirer quoted a member of the eight-man provincial capital's maintenance team, which was sent on separate occasions to clear a mountaintop of Payao, a southern village in Batac town, Ilocos Norte.

Members of the cleaning brigade came from the provincial capital's maintenance crew and the Mariano Marcos State University (MMSU) in Batac, which owns land in the village for its community outreach projects and agro-industrial courses.

They have been receiving orders from the capital's community affairs office, they said, adding that they have just cleared an area for a helipad that could accommodate at least three helicopters.

"We just cleared the bushes and developed a trail on our way to the mountain's peak," the crewman said.

The cleaning team ride a service car up to the foot of the mountain, and then walk all the way up to the peak, for more than an hour.

"We had to stop several times to catch our breath because the mountain is too steep. The air at the top is different. The view up there is simply exhilarating. It is as if you can reach out to the Currimao coast," the crewman said.