Viewpoint
When TV crews race cargo ships with airplanes and helicopters, the cameras always win,” John Crowley of Harvard’s Humanitarian Initiative wrote after supertyphoon “Yolanda/Haiyan” battered the Visayas.
Planes can fly 24 to 48 hours after a storm clears. And disembarking journalists will pan on contorted faces of traumatized victims. Reports zero in on the gap between supply and demand. These are facts. But context can slip between the cracks.
Yolanda’s winds gusted at 315 kilometers per hour, smashing through Storm Category 5 ceiling. Storm surges left corpses and traumatized survivors and shattered pre-positioned stocks.
The massive aid needed come only by ship. That takes days. Repair of damaged ports, roads stretch into weeks. “But when media focuses on looting and slow aid they miss the point,” Crowley added. “Information is aid… Scaremongering undermines relief effort…”
“The Philippines is captive to its geography,” wrote Jennifer Keister at Cato Institute in Washington. The country sprawls over 7,132 islands — at low tide. Like many developing countries, it is “captive to political dysfunction.” Poverty, corruption, poll irregularities and pervasive political patronage gut what is, on surface, democratic government.
We saw that in Bohol, ruptured by a 7.2-magnitude earthquake Oct. 15. And in 1991, typhoon “Uring” tore at Ormoc. Over 8,000 died, as today’s memorial recalls. In 2011, “Sendong/Washi” ripped through Cagayan de Oro and Iligan, inflicting 1,453 deaths. A year later, “Pablo/Bopha” flattened much of Davao Oriental and Compostela.
The “blame game” meanwhile, intensifies, Sun.Star’s opinion editor Bong Wenceslao noted. Critics of President Benigno Aquino III scour reports on government’s response to Yolanda and storm surge-hit Tacloban City. “They feast on every sign of incompetence they’ve long accused him of possessing.”
“All rules of decency are jettisoned. And profanities are thrown at will (‘asshole,’ ‘gago’). Admittedly, government response has been inadequate. So there are materials for critics to lambast their pet peeve.” But to be P-Noy-centric is to distort reality. It smudges the complexity of the events.”
“As so often happens, the best human stories are those that didn’t make the 6 o’clock news”, former University of the Philippines mass communication graduate Angioline Loredo e-mailed. Her family has pitched in the massive citizen efforts to help. Some in media “make it appear the whole country is exploding,” she wrote. “One has to remind one’s self of the silent triumph of the human spirit amidst unspeakable horror. This is the worst and best time to practice journalism.”
There are more Yolanda/Haiyans ahead. “We are now entering a period of consequences… in the global climate crisis,” noted Nobel laureate Al Gore. But the impact isn’t spread equally. “The burden is heaviest for countries close to the equator,” World Bank says. This is compounded by lack of “economic, institutional, scientific, and technical capacity to cope and adapt.”
The “calamity fund” has been doubled since 2009. But the till is near empty, sapped by serial disasters. What isn’t funded by international aid must come from siphoning into other programs. How many typhoon victims could have been helped from the squandered pork barrel ala Janet Lim-Napoles? Ask Bong, Juan Ponce, Jinggoy and Bongbong & Co.
The United Nations says risk-reduction laws here are “among the best in the world.” At least on paper,” the Washington Post notes. They stipulate that P7 out of every P10 in disaster spending go to long-term measures. The task for lowering disaster risk falls on local governments. “Some operate like little fiefdoms.” Think Ampatuans or Chavit Singson.
The embedded system of patronage and strongman politics hobbled response, wrote Jennifer Keisgter who did three years research here. “Haiyan highlights the degree to which these pathologies generate under-preparedness and confound relief efforts. The system is prone to under-provision of public goods and services broadly, but particularly ill-suited to disaster preparedness.” That’s academic jargon for g-r-a-f-t.
Ilocos Norte Gov. Imee Marcos stashed a secret account in the Virgin Islands, International Consortium of Investigative Journalists reported. So did mint-new Sen. Joseph Victor Estrada. They glossed that over in their statements of assets and liabilities. So, did they dip into that to help typhoon victims? Next question please.
Sleaze erodes “public trust to levels that residents may not obey exhortations to evacuate,” Keisgter adds. (Others) may not believe government will protect their property from looters or squatters if they did. Trust in government is the linchpin.
Strongman politics distorts distribution of disaster aid. “Disaster response (here) is often plagued by allegations that local authorities hoard aid supplies. (They) distribute it only to political supporters or family members.”
Like vultures that scent carrion, profiteering businessmen swoop on aid distribution. “Conspiracy theories are an understandable refuge for frustrated populations whose predicament result from many factors. But the persistence of such accusations suggest they may contain an element of truth.”
“Aid agencies are required to work through local politicians.” Many may serve their constituents with integrity. Keisgter adds. In many instances, “aid providers find themselves confronting a devil-or-deep-blue-sea quandary”: choose “between supporting political pathologies they find unappealing” or try to help victims directly and be zapped.
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