AS SEEN ON TV
Mascot of Disaster
During her 9th State of the Nation Address last July President Gloria Arroyo bragged about the country’s state of disaster preparedness with noteworthy confidence that the people are ready to cope with calamity. President Arroyo even cited that the Philippines is a model of disaster preparedness and that this is recognized by the international community.
She rants: “International authorities have taken notice that we are safer from environmental degradation and man-made disasters. As a country in the path of typhoons and in the Pacific Rim of Fire, we must be prepared as the latest technology permits to anticipate natural calamities when that is possible; to extend immediate and effective relief when it is not.”
And then she rambled on about what has been done in various parts of the country to identify disaster-prone areas with an almost dreamy tone: “The mapping of flood- and landslide-prone areas is almost complete. Early warning, forecasting and monitoring systems have been improved, with weather tracking facilities in Subic, Tagaytay, Mactan, Mindanao, Pampanga.”
At that time the country was reeling from Typhoon Frank so her SONA also covered advances in flood prone areas (including Iloilo) to remedy time-immemorial flooding, “We have worked on flood control infrastructure like those for Pinatubo, Agno, Laoag, and Abucay, which will pump the run off waters from Quezon City and Tondo flooding Sampaloc. This will help relieve hundreds of hectares in this old city of its age-old woe. Patuloy naman iyong sa Camanava, dagdag sa Pinatubo, Iloilo, Pasig-Marikina, Bicol River Basin, at mga river basin ng Mindanao.”
And then on September 26, 2009 Typhoon Ondoy leaves a trail of unimaginable destruction. The nation’s capital, helpless.
Looking back President Arroyo’s SONA sounded surreal, like she was referring to another country, not the Philippines.
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Ondoy’s destruction is extreme (even iconic) that the United Nations is now citing the Philippines, not the picture of disaster readiness as the SONA would have painted, but a model of the kind of devastation wrought by natural calamities on an ill-prepared nation.
International environmentalists point to Typhoon Ondoy as “a glimpse into the kind of turbulent weather that could be unleashed by warming temperatures.” They are now pushing world leaders to resume global warming talks that have been deadlocked for months when industrial countries (top billed by India and China) refused cut industrial production, help poor nations adapt to the impacts of climate change and decrease carbon emissions.
On September 28, two days after Typhoon Ondoy the UN reiterated its warning to world leaders to agree to limit global warming, citing floods in the Philippines as a dire consequence if such an agreement is not reached.
We’re officially the mascot of global warming!
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The Philippines is not exactly a top industrial polluter as China and India.
The country falls more under the category of “calamity victim” or one of those poor nations that need help in adapting to climate change, because its own government has not done much to abate the effects of global warming. Only a handful of lawmakers have pushed the climate change agenda which is usually drowned out by more urgent political bills.
Aside from lack of laws, many local government units also have themselves to blame for the mess they’re in. Their monumental problems on coping with disasters began when they approved human settlement in supposed flood-prone areas. The Ondoy experience highlights the fact that posh subdivisions such as Provident and many others were even given government permits to erect houses in Marikina’s or Rizal’s death valley.
Ondoy opened the country’s eyes to disaster unpreparedness, accentuated by the government’s ineptness to rescue its citizens or even provide relief. LGU’s were in a catatonic state when Ondoy struck. The very little relief and rescue equipment available were provided by philanthropists. How frustrating it is to rely on a government that also depends on the private sector for help!
But the government is not to blame (not totally) for the mud we find ourselves stuck!
We have also abused the environment in our personal capacity as polluters. We have dirtied our air and rivers. We have chopped off trees, mined our mountains, dumped unsorted garbage wherever convenient, and encouraged other environmentally hostile practices.
All this time we wallowed in wanton ignorance that we will be invincible when nature strikes back. And we were wrong.
Typhoon Ondoy may have been an act of GOD but the disaster that resulted from it, is clearly self-inflicted.