Three months after Sendong, Iligan residents still far from rebuilding their lives

“Even before the typhoon struck, our area already didn’t have access to potable water from the local water company. We had to buy drinking water from a company that sells mineral water, and even then it was expensive,” she said.

A five-gallon plastic container of drinking water costs P30 ($0.7143), and the Omar family uses one day. Every week, they spend P210 ($5) for water and P840 ($20) for a month’s supply.

“It took a while for the water company to resume its operations and to send its delivery trucks to our homes here. We were forced to boil water sourced from the hand pump so we could have drinking water. Two of my children had stomach problems like diarrhea and I felt that it was my fault because I didn’t boil the water properly,” she said.

In the meantime, another child fell ill with leptospirosis.

(Photos by Ina Alleco Silverio / bulatlat.com)

“We’ve always known that there were rats here. The children often liked to wade and play in the puddles that remained after the flood, and my five-year old daughter had open wounds in her feet. The doctor in the public hospital said that that’s how she got leptospirosis — the rat urine and feces mixed with the water in the puddles and the flood water,” she said.

Homes for the rendered homeless

Last March 6, it was announced that 102 houses would be constructed by March 15 in Sta. Elena Bayanihan Village also in Iligan. This is through the joint efforts of the City Engineer’s Office, City Mayor’s-Technical Division, and Philippine Institute of Civil Engineers Iligan Bay Chapter.

City Engineer Franklin Maata was quoted as saying that the construction efforts were delayed because of a shortage of hollow blocks in Iligan. They are already buying hollow blocks in other areas of Lanao del Norte to supplement Iligan’s construction materials needs.

In the meantime, late last month, The National Housing Authority (NHA) said that it would purchase lots that would be used as relocation sites for affected families in Iligan city whose houses were washed out. The NHA was said to be sending a team to Iligan city to assess the prices of the lots presented by the owners to be used as relocation sites. The NHA is also coordinating with humanitarian and relief organizations that have offered to build more permanent shelters and houses for the victims.

While the relief agencies wait for the government to turn over land where houses for the victims can be built, tent cities and camps have been established in various areas in iligan.

One such tent city is in Luinab and it serves as the temporary home of 156 families. The average family has between two to six children. The tents were donated by an international relief agency each tent spans some 20 square meters. Inside the floor is laid with thick plastic and rubber matting. There is no electricity inside the tents, but the refugees are lent flashlights, and there are lamp posts that are turned on at night.

Thirty-four year old Lennie Liza Rinez lives in one of the tents with her husband and two children. The elder is Jandy, a two year old girl with big and beautiful doe eyes, while the younger is a six-month old baby boy named Matthew. Lenni’s husband sells peanuts in the city proper, and earns P200 ($5) a day.

The Rinezes had no options left when Sendong struck. They used to live in a rented, one room house in Katipunan in Hinaplonan, and the typhhon destroyed it.

“We had nowhere else to go. At first we lived with relatives, but there was no space in their house either, and it didn’t seem to right to impose our presence on them too much because they,too, were victims of the typhoon. Their house survived, but there wasn’t space there for another family with two young children,” she said.

(Photo by Ina Alleco Silverio / bulatlat.com)

Lennie is a little embarrassed to show their tent-home because, as she said, she had not tidied up.

“It’s a little hard to keep everything clean and orderly with two small children always getting into everything,” she said. Inside the tent, clothes clean and dirty were strewn everywhere along with empty plastic bottles and containers which Lennie explained to be the children’s playthings. It was clear that they did not have too many belongings. The small televison they used to own was lost in the flood.

“We didn’t get to save anything but clothes when the water started rising. We all just ran out of the house and kept moving until we got to an evacuation center,” she said.

Lennie shared that while daytime is hot and humid in the tent city, the nights could get very cold. Lennie makes her two children wear sweaters at night, but they still catch colds. The baby boy, in particular, keeps coughing in the afternoons. Lennie is worried that he might have tuberculosis.

“The settlement administration and the relief group gives us vitamins and vitamin drops for the children, but I would much rather take my children to the doctor,” she said.

While clean drinking water is not a problem in the tent site as the relief agency supplies 4,000 liters twice a week, there are other factors that need to be addressed to ensure that the refugees do not fall ill, especially the children.

The back area of the campsite was cleared and toilet stalls were built, numbering nine to 12 in all. Most of the toilets, upon inspection, were foul and dirty. The refugees explained that they couldn’t clean the toilets regularly as they should because the water supply was too far from the toilet area. The stalls for bathing were put up in the front area of the camp site where the water pump is, and where the relief group’s water delivery truck releases its contents through a hose and into a gigantic water bag that functions as the camp’s water storage facility.

During a lecture on hygiene given by relief volunteers Lennie promised to pay more attention to keeping clean habits inside the tent and outside. Her immediate neighbors also do the same.

“I know it’s important to keep clean because it’s what will help keep us healthy and less susceptible to sickness,” she said.

The long road to recovery for Iligan

It is clear that three months after Sendong, much still needs to be done to ensure the complete recovery of the affected families. Even as everything appears to have returned to normal for the rest of the city and province — business establishments have opened, the local government offices and police and security agencies have returned to their normal operations — the residents affected by Sendong still have a long way to go before they can pick up what remains of their lives before the typhoon struck.

Many of the affected families are unemployed, and those who do have work do not earn enough. Their meager wages as day laborers, household help, and utility workers are already far from being enough to cover their family’s basic needs. The challenges they continue to face in the aftermath of Sendong are still considerable as they have to contend with either major house repairs or to completely find new shelters. Either way, they need financial aid.

In the meantime, to restore their sense of dignity, the affected families also need to be provided with means of livelihood and subsistence. Many were employed before the Sendong struck, but lost their jobs afterwards. Others chose to stop working so they can focus on rebuilding their houses, and even with the aid of humanitarian groups, the process is fraught with difficulty. The affected residents of Iligan need all the help they can get if they are to get their lives to return to normal again.