Cebu City Disaster Council awaits budget to fix damaged roads in Buot, Sinsin

The vehicle owned by former Cebu City administrator, Floro Casas Jr., fell off the roadside into a river in Barangay Buot. | Photo Courtesy of Floro Casas Jr.

CEBU CITY, Philippines — The damaged roads in the mountain barangays of Cebu City will remain to be a danger unless the repair of these roads will finally begin.

This was the statement of Gerry Carillo, Cebu City Disaster Council chairperson, on May 19, 2022, when the vehicle of a former city official fell off the roadside into a river in Barangay Buot.

Lawyer Floro Casas Jr., said in a Facebook post, that he was not in the pick-up truck when it happened past 10 a.m. on Thursday, but fortunately, the passengers and driver sustained only minor injuries.

“Akong pickup nahulog sa pangpang sa Brgy Buot. Wala ko sa sakyanan. Thank God, bisan taas ang nahagbungan, safe with minor injuries ra ang passengers,” said Casas.

(My pickup fell on a cliff in Brgy Buot. I was not in the vehicle. Thank God, even if they fell from quite a height, the passengers were safe and only suffered minor injuries.)

Carillo said the area where the incident happened was one of the roads in the mountain barangays that had been badly damaged.

The Cebu City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (CDRRMO) has asked for a P100 million budget to fix the damaged infrastructure in the mountain barangay.

Of the budget, P50 million is allocated for materials and another P50 million for renting heavy equipment.

Yet this budget is still pending with the City Council and the tackling of such has been delayed due to the elections. The council did not hold a session for a while due to the elections.

“We are really hoping na we will get the budget because kailangan na gyod nato na sila ayuhon immediately,” said Carillo.

(We are really hoping that we will get the budget because we really need to repair that immediately.)

For now, while the damage still remain, Carillo urged motorists to be careful when passing areas where apparent road damage could be seen.

The CDRRMO has placed barriers in the road in Barangay Buot to prevent any more accidents of vehicles falling off the roadside from happening again.

As the rainy season officially began on May 18, 2022, Carillo said there was an imperative need to fix the roads and they were hoping that the City Council would find the urgency to pass the budget as soon as possible.

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