By ARTHUR L. ALLAD-IW Northern Dispatch Bulatlat.com BAGUIO CITY — “It came unexpected, like a thief in the night. For a few minutes, a thick layer of landslide roaring down swept our village, and instantly claimed the lives of 35 residents.” That is how a survivor described, in Kankanaey, the worst landslide that hit Sitio…
Tags: pepeng
Ondoy Survivors at Ultra Victimized Twice Over
By JANESS ANN J. ELLAO
As if the trauma of losing their homes and belongings were not enough, evacuees at the PhilSports Arena, formerly known as the Ultra, faced more problems as the government seemingly backtracked on its promise to relocate the displaced families. Worse, the Pasig government allegedly had to use underhanded means to force the refugees to leave.
Coal-Fired Plants Undermine Arroyo’s Approval of Climate-Change Law
By JANESS ANN J. ELLAO
The Arroyo administration will have to work extra hard to prove that it is sincere in addressing climate change and its impacts. Signing the climate-change bill into law is one thing – approving the operation of coal-fired power plants, which have been identified as one of the dirtiest power-generation methods, makes a mockery of it.
Help Comes to Devastated Folk of Laguna Town but They Fret Over What Comes Next
By JANESS ANN J. ELLAO
With the flooding after Ondoy and the blaming of poor peasants and fisherfolks around the Laguna de Bay, many in Pila, Laguna, fear that the demolition of their homes is now just a matter of time.
Class and Ondoy: The Philippine Daily Inquirer’s Ideological Distortions
By GILL H. BOEHRINGER
By seeking to convince its readers that the effects of Ondoy were “felt equally by rich and poor” and that it was a “great equalizer,” the Philippine Daily Inquirer, the most influential newspaper in the Philippines, was attempting to bolster the view that the Filipino class system had nothing to do with the disaster, and that the lives of all Filipinos are shaped by the same forces of nature, even by fate or by God.
Amid Threat to Food Security, Government Opens More Farm Lands to Foreign Firms
MANILA — The recent typhoons highlighted land and crop use conversion as a factor in worsening the effects of disasters on food production and the need to ensure adequate land for food production. However amid all these, government has reserved more hectares of agricultural land for export crops and use of foreign agro-corporations. According to…
As Philippines Reels from Calamity, ‘Big Three’ Hike Oil Prices; ‘Greed’ Denounced
By MARYA SALAMAT
While the government bears down on small businesses and producers, warning them against profiteering in the wake of typhoons Ondoy and Pepeng, it has allowed Shell, Caltex and Petron to increase oil prices at will.
Dams and how communities deal with them
Dams, among others, are packaged as part of development that people have to live with. But, as can be gleaned from Bulatlat’s stories on the subject, dams have proven to be a bane to the public.
Disaster-Relief Fatigue
Ni ROLANDO B. TOLENTINO Kulturang Popular Kultura Bulatlat.com MANILA — Sunod-sunod ba naman ang super-typhoon, mula Ondoy, Pepeng at Ramil, na pawang malalawak at mararahas ang saklaw ng epekto, bakit hindi ka naman mapapagod sa sunod-sunod ding kailangang relief operations? Parang na ngang defensa laban sa ikatlong People Power, napagod na raw ang mga taong…
Slideshow: Pepeng’s Fury
Pepeng Unleashes Fury
Two Tales of Loss from Little Kibungan
By JOAN GARCIA Bulatlat.com LA TRINIDAD, Benguet — It had been raining for days and Ernesto Gayo was worried that his crops in their hometown of Barangay Cuenca, Pugo, La Union, would be ruined. He has been a farmer all his life and was anxious that the continuous outpouring of rain would damage his harvest.…