More Anger On the Government's Slow Response To Flood Victims

Excerpts from an article on the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

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“It’s plain incompetence of the leadership, and government was absent,” said Sen. Loren Legarda.

The National Disaster Coordinating Center (NDCC), she said, “clearly has no action plan.”

Legarda called for a review of NDCC activities.

“Can they say they don’t have money or power (to mitigate the) effects of disasters? Of course not,” the senator said, pointing out that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has an annual P2-billion “calamity fund.”

“What sticks out from the aftermath of Ondoy is that the Arroyo government is not prepared to handle such emergency situations. It is very clear that those who were stranded overwhelmingly outnumber available rubber boats and members of rescue teams,” said KMU chair Elmer Labog in a statement.

Labog said the television and radio ads by Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro Jr. on disaster preparedness proved a waste of taxpayers’ money.

“Clearly, the government is not putting where its mouth is. All those infomercials that supposedly project disaster preparedness, especially those by Mr. Teodoro, is only as good as on-camera scenes,” Labog said.

As the death toll from flash floods rose, analysts said the anger could damage the prospects of Secretary Teodoro, the administration’s candidate in the May presidential election.

“His 0.2 percent popularity could be zero by now,” political analyst and columnist Nelson Navarro said of Teodoro.

“There was a massive failure in government and the direction of management response,” said Mario Taguiwalo, president of the National Institute for Policy Studies think-tank.

“The root cause is you have a government whose predominant preoccupation is with graft and corruption—how to steal more money from the people,” Taguiwalo said.

“If your officials are not motivated to serve and just motivated to steal, then that’s the kind of response you get.”

Read the full article on the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

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