Museum Director Jeremy Barns wants no ruins in Zamboanga or inside Fort

ZAMBOANGA CITY (ZNS) -  If the Executive Director of the National Museum will have his way, he does not want to see any ruins (Fort Pilar included) in the city of Zamboanga.

“At the heart of the city, you should not have ruins like that,” said Barns in an interview with media Thursday after meeting with a cross section of local leaders regarding the renovations inside Fort PIlar.

“I don’t want to see ruins,” Barns was also quoted as saying, after the meeting.

On the other hand, City Councilor VP Elago said the National Museum and the city government has already reached an informal agreement on the controversial repairs, renovation being made inside Fort Pilar.

Elago who is the chairman of the tourism committee in the city council said this informal but verbal agreement came about after a meeting between Barns and several stockholders who objected to the plastering of lime and Pozolan cement over the brick ruins at the fort.

According to Elago, the executive director agreed to return to the “original forms” the plastered walls of the fort.

He admitted that the talk on the removal of the white plasters and paints over the brick ruins was informal but insists that that was the “agreement”.

Nothing was said about any mechanism that what Barns will say will be implemented at all as the workers are all set to continue plastering the walls as money have been provided for the project.

It was obvious that the National Museum only talked to city officials about their project but never consulted with local historians and get their opinions over the matter.

The majority of those who voices opposition to the plastering project at Fort Pilar  as the project involved covering the brick ruins at the fort.

Later it was learned that the National Museum plans to put up a souvenir shop, a café and some other business enterprises, structures or functions that were never a  part of the original fort constructed during the Spanish regime.

Notwithstanding these announced future plans for the fort, Barns said that they did not change anything at the fort.

Incidentally, the ruins of a chapel in the fort has been converted into something else. The chapel is not part of the restoration work at the complex.

“Maybe, some other time,” said Barns, referring to the Chapel. (ZNS)

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