Many Cebu officials from both sides of the political fence welcomed President Benigno Aquino III’s official approval of the rehabilitation plan for northern Cebu and other provinces hit by supertyphoon Yolanda.
At the same time, they asked why he only made it official publicly in last Monday’s State of the Nation Address (SONA).
Medellin Mayor Ricardo Ramirez, one of the Cebu mayors who loudly complained about the turtle-like pace of rehabilitation, and even a Liberal Party (LP) ally, Daanbantayan Mayor Augusto Corro said rehabilitation could have been implemented sooner, rather than nine months after the storm.
But as President Aquino said in his State of the Nationo Address, the President’s team had to carefully go over every detail of the rehabilitation plans submitted by each local government unit (LGUs) hit by Yolanda before finally giving its imprimatur, even if thousands of typhoon victims had to scrape, beg and condemn their local officials for their inability to provide them shelter and material assistance.
The national law prescribing the use of calamity funds had a process that would take too long from the bottom up. The reality was that devastated barangays, towns and cities were in no shape to cough up precise data about their misery on a tight deadline. So Secretary Panfilo Lacson and his team had to jumpstart the assessment process and do their best to reconcile data with whatever a local government could give.
The Province of Cebu was the first to submit its report for 15 storm-torn towns and one city, a report so detailed and grassroots-based, Lacson’s office called it a template for others to follow.
Now that President Aquino has announced his approval of the P12.2 billion plan for north Cebu, Cebu has to be just as aggressive in following up its release in actual projects and services through the line agencies.
The bulk of the plan is pegged for housing for displaced storm victims at P70,000 per unit following an earth-block house design.
Too much has already been said about Tacloban receiving the lion’s share of foreign and national assistance followng the CNN Anderson Cooper story, the feud between Interior and Local Governments Secretary Mar Roxas and Tacloban Mayor Alfredo Rodriguez.
Rather than viewing the delayed approval of the rehabilitation plan through the filter of political partisanship, we have to ask whether the national government’s setup for emergency response and rehabilitation is quick, immediate, responsive and adequate enough to meet the growing challenges of climate-induced calamities.
While it’s important to set up stringent requirements to avoid pork barrel milking by the likes of Janet Lim-Napoles and her corrupt beneficiaries, it is just as important for government not to be bogged down by red tape, politics and corruption in providing immediate aid to its constituents.
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