BAGUIO CITY – The Cordillera Regional Development Council (RDC-CAR) will be sending a lobby group to the offices of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC), the Department of Agriculture (DA) and the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to seek the granting of immediate assistance to address the huge damages suffered by the region during the recent onslaught of Tropical Cyclone Ineng.
Abra Gov. Eustaquio Bersamin, who is the incumbent RDC-CAR chairman, said it was agreed during the recent RDC-CAR executive committee meeting that the lobby group will be composed of local chief executives from the Cordillera and regional directors from concerned agencies so that they will be able to get immediate commitments from heads of departments for their specific concerns.
“We decided that we will visit the Secretaries in group so that we can get their commitments instead of writing them because that will take sometime before being acted upon. What the calamity-stricken provinces need right now are specific actions on our concerns,” Bersamin stressed.
He cited in Abra, the estimated damages were pegged at P642 million both in infrastructure and agriculture, thus, the need for concerned government agencies to extend short, medium and long-term assistance to allow the thousands of affected people to be able to recover from the wrath of the weather disturbance and for the basic infrastructure to be restored.
Among the Secretaries to be visited by the lobby group are Agriculture Secretary Proceso J. Alcala and Public Works Secretary Rogelio L. Singson.
Bersamin disclosed participation to the lobby group by the local chief executives will be on a voluntary basis and that the schedule of the trip to Manila will be scheduled by the RDC-CAR after ascertaining the availability of their schedules and their appointments with the concerned government officials who will personally attend to their issues and concerns.
Based on the latest damage assessment report from the Office of Civil Defense (OCD) in the Cordillera, the Cordillera sustained over P1.24 billion damage to infrastructure, P563 million for local roads, P522 million damage to the region’s irrigation system and P156.7 million initial damage to national roads and over P500 million damage to agriculture among others.
Bersamin called on local chief executives in the different parts of the region to make themselves available to attend their scheduled visit to the Secretaries of concerned government agencies in order to represent their respective localities in lobbying for immediate support to allow their people to recover from the serious negative effects of the weather disturbance.
According to him, the unity and teamwork of the local government officials and regional directors of line agencies will definitely make a big difference in sending the message to national officials on the need to grant them the needed assistance to allow their places to recover from the wrath of the typhoon last month, thus, the need for everyone’s cooperation for the sake of the region’s overall development.
While awaiting for the scheduled visit to the different department secretaries for the needed support to the region, Bersamin claimed the concerned local governments will have to temporarily with the emergency assistance being extended to the typhoon affected areas by the regional line agencies serving the needs of the people. By Dexter A. See
