Bulatlat - The Philippines's alternative weekly newsmagazine

This story was taken from Bulatlat, the Philippines's alternative weekly newsmagazine (www.bulatlat.com, www.bulatlat.net, www.bulatlat.org).
Vol. VI, No. 6, March 12-18, 2006

Factors behind Guinsaugon Disaster

The crisis facing thousands of survivors of a killer landslide that buried Barangay Guinsaugon in St. Bernard town, Southern Leyte more than three weeks ago refuses to rest. Despite concerted rescue and retrieval operations by the international aid groups, only 152 bodies were unearthed from the sludge zone while more than 900 individuals are still missing and presumed dead.

BY DENNIS ESPADA
Bulatlat

Natural calamities do happen, as both disaster managers and environment experts took turns in telling the public that we could have done something to prevent it or reduce its impact.

Yet, vain efforts are carried out only when the damage has been done.

Triggering and conditioning factors

Ricarido Saturay Jr., a geologist from the National Institute of Geological Sciences, University of the Philippines (UP-NIGS) believes that the disaster may have been caused by two factors: first, the triggering factors which are the direct and immediate causes and second, the conditioning factors which had already been in place long before the disaster took place.

Fifteen years ago, a parallel catastrophe claimed the lives of 8,000 residents in Ormoc City. Since the horrifying flashfloods and landslides that killed more than 200 people in Panaon Island in December 2003, Saturay said, measures to address both factors were non-existent or at the least, not implemented even after Saint Bernard town was identified as "landslide-prone" area by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources' Mines and Geosciences Bureau (DENR-MGB) on that same year.

“The intensity and amount of rainfall would be the most suspect triggering factor,” Saturay explained in a statement. “The reported earthquake could be discounted considering its low magnitude, epicentral distance to the site, and the timing of the two events. The conditioning factors are those that we have good knowledge of, such as weak rocks due to the Philippine Fault zone, thick soils due to the climate and steep slopes. The land cover and land use also fall into this category.”

Budget constraints and lack of personnel are the topmost dilemma and the national government is certainly aware of this.

“In other countries,” Saturay said, “potential amount and intensity of incoming rain has been successfully measured using precipitation radars. A good network of rain gauges sending out near-real time data or even crude locally based rain gauges can give a warning a few hours before a disaster. However, the PAGASA (Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical Astronomical Services Administration) does not have a very good network of rain gauges in the area, much more precipitation radars.”

Saturay said the MGB could have created a detailed geologic hazard map but with its limited resources, it proved to be an impossible endeavor. DENR sources said that the agency has desisted from taking on the task due to complaints that such maps tend to downgrade the value of land properties and thus, discourage investors.

As long as the country’s science and technology remain backward, Saturay said, it would be difficult not only to generate the necessary knowledge to forecast a disaster but also to disseminate these to the public.

Unprepared

Every year, the country is battered by at least 317 disasters, according to the Citizens Disaster Response Center (CDRC). They said the figures have increased in the last decade, from 408 in 1995 to last year's 440, affecting a total of 9.9 and 10.4 million people respectively.

While the government allocates 30 percent of the annual budget to foreign debt servicing, it spends a measly 0.1 percent for calamity funds.

To make matters worse, CDRC said, funds allocated or donated for the victim's needs are lost to corruption. The National Disaster and Coordinating Council (NDCC) has to account for the millions of funds and relief aid in the aftermath of Quezon and Aurora tragedies in 2004.

For environmental protection groups, the Macapagal-Arroyo administration should be held liable for the calamity in Saint Bernard, particularly because of its failure to devise a disaster management program at the community level, including geo-hazard information, land-use planning, early warning system and evacuation procedures.

Clemente Bautista Jr., national coordinator of Kalikasan-People's Network for the Environment (KPNE) called for “immediate relocation to safer grounds of communities at risk from landslides and flashfloods, and the provision not only of relief but of alternative livelihood and services to displaced communities.”

Plunder as “real state of emergency”

KPNE is convenor of Environment and Natural Resource Advocates for Gloria’s Expulsion (Enraged), an alliance of environmentalists calling for President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s removal from office.

Illegal commercial logging, for instance, were blamed for denuding the forests of Quezon province. Experts consider mining liberalization as the culprit behind the devastation of freshwater, mountains and coastal ecosystems.

With large-scale extractive industries for export, Bautista said, the country’s natural resources is on the brink of ruin, while countless people are already deprived of their right to inhale clean air, drink safe water, eat nutritious food and dwell in a hazard-free environment. Bulatlat

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