BURNED TO THE GROUND

Some eight hundred houses were razed in a fire that hit a 9-hectare area encompassing Barangays Guizo and Mantuyong in Mandaue City. (CDN PHOTO/FERDINAND EDRALIN)

Alejandro Amoto, 53, a mason,  had thought luck was on his side since  his house  was left untouched while those of his next-door neighbor and about a thousand others were destroyed by the fire that hit Barangay Mantuyong,  Mandaue City in 2007.

But luck wasn’t in his favor this time around  for the mason. Omoto, his five adult children and their respective families were left with only their clothes on their backs after a four-hour fire of catastrophic magnitude burned to the ground at dawn yesterday some 800 structures housing 1,844 families on a 9-hectare city-owned  land and  left at least 9,000 persons homeless.

SFO2 Cipriano Codilla, investigator of the Mandaue City Fire Department,  said the fire started in the house of Robinson Aljun, 53, a construction worker, who told investigators that it was caused by a lighted kerosene lamp inside his shanty along Zone 3 of Barangay Mantuyong that he believed was knocked down by a stray cat.

Aljun narrated that he and his young wife were eating outside their house around 1:45 a.m. and left their two sleeping children, ages 5 and 6,  inside with a lighted kerosene lamp when they noticed the fire spreading inside their house.

“Nagtuo ko nga kadtong suga diha sa lamesa natandugan to sa iring kay daghan kaayo manulod iring diri bisan asa lang gikan  (I believe that the kerosene lamp placed at the table was knocked down by a cat as there are a lot of cats coming from everywhere here),”  Aljun, now among those sheltered at the Cebu International Convention Center (CICC),  told Cebu Daily News.

Aljun said his family was using a kerosene lamp for some time now as their electric service was disconnected due to unpaid bills.

But Manuel Comendador, 57, a Guizo resident for almost 40 years, was a bitter man, as he believed that he lost his home because some shabu (methamphetamine hydrochloride) users in his neighborhood were engaged in a drug session and had left a lighted candle unattended.

Victims of the fire that hit Barangay Guizo in Mandaue City use tarpauline as their temporary shelter while others line up (background) in front of the barangay hall to get relief goods from the City Social Welfare and Services. (CDN PHOTO/JUNJIE MENDOZA)

“Mao ba gyud kaha nahitabo? Motuo gyud mi adunay nanuyop diha dapita (Is that really what happened? We really believed that there was a pot session there),” Comendador said.

Guizo Barangay Captain Jesus Neri said he was aware that both Guizo and Mantuyong were known to have numerous drug users but there was no evidence to prove that a lighted candle used in a drug session caused the fire.

Senior Supt. Jonathan Cabal, the city’s police chief,  also stressed there was no basis to conclude that drug users started the fire.

Senior Insp. Janelito Marquez,  the city police’s  anti-illegal drugs chief, told CDN that a drug raid had been conducted in Mantuyong but he could no longer recall when.

The fire site is separated by a creek and a manmade canal from the Mandaue reclamation area. Many of the fire victims’ houses were situated along the three-meter easement of these waterways.

Yesterday’s fire was the fifth to hit the same area and the biggest to hit Mandaue since 1992.

About 2,000 people were made homeless by a fire in September 1992; followed by another fire in March 8, 2007 that displaced 1,000 families; then came the March 13, 2009 fire that razed 400 houses; and the Oct. 29, 2011 fire that destroyed 15 shanties.  In yesterday’s fire, 908 families (4540 individuals) lost homes in Mantuyong and 936 families (4680) in Guizo.

The Mandaue City Fire Department received the alarm at 1:45 a.m. yesterday but firefighters had a hard time controlling the blaze due to the narrow roads that were made narrower by parked vehicles, mostly multicabs, owned by residents in the area, said Codilla.

Mandaue City Fire Marshall Joel Abarquez added that even if their firefighters did get to reach the fire scene, the area was too congested that the fire simply leaped from one house to the next in no time at all.

Despite the efforts of firefighters from Mandaue City augmented by other firefighters from as far as Danao City in the north and the City of Naga in the south, the fire that began in Mantuyong had spread to Sitio Sta. Cruz, Guizo before it was put out at around 5:48 a.m.

Mandaue City Mayor Jonas Cortes, who inspected the area, assured that officials in the two barangays and the City Social Welfare and Services would be on hand to address the needs of the fire victims, who are now all temporarily housed at the unused CICC that was loaned to the Mandaue City by the Cebu provincial government.

Sitio Sta. Cruz in Guizo, which is most affected by the fire, was placed under a state of calamity yesterday afternoon, said Neri. The barangay officials of Mantuyong had also declared Zone 3 in a state of calamity.

City Social Welfare and Services (CSWS) personnel were caught unprepared by the huge number of fire victims that they ended up initially feeding them with biscuits.

As it is, the CSWS still has its hands full attending to the needs of another group of about 500 victims of the fire that hit Sitio Alliance of Two Hearts in Barangay Basak, last Feb. 22.

The victims received packed lunches from CSWS and relief packages from sixth district Rep. Luigi Quisumbing later in the day.

Some of the victims also opted to stay with relatives, others were given shelter in a neighboring  Mormon Church while some just pitched tents in vacant lots nearby.

Cortes said he has asked the city council to convene for an emergency session and declare the fire-affected villages as calamity areas to speed up the release of aid to the victims. Medical and rescue teams were also set in place at CICC, along with temporary lighting, portable toilets and tents.

Cabal, meanwhile, said policemen were deployed both at the fire scene and the CICC to assist the victims.