AS I WRITE, typhoon Opong alternates between fierce and gentle in Metro Manila and is forecast to be wildest south of the metropolis and in central Luzon this weekend. Of course, the flooding will come next which makes affected areas a river for days and its residents suffer discomfort, inconvenience, even death at worst.
TROPICAL STORM ONDOY
And my mind goes back to September 26, 2009 when tropical storm Ondoy jolted my city of Marikina with an experience never gone through even by the oldest residents. I was then composing an email to send to Singapore prior to my official trip there when a man pounded our gate to warn that the flood was nearing waist-high. I then saw the water rising to the roof of my car outside the house ready to be driven after my email goes through. How my heart bled!
The Ondoy rainfall, which amounted to about two months’ volume in 12 hours and hovered on the peak 21.9 level mark on the bridge in Marikina River, forced evacuation of families from mostly the riverside barangays to school buildings.
Other unforgettable scenes: various debris including appliances afloat, a seemingly refugee march on the streets the next day as no vehicle could ply; some bodies, of humans and animals thatsurfaced in the mud; work, schooling, life suspended for about a week. The worst water disaster in the country (till typhoon Yolanda with its unfamiliar tsunamis devastated Leyte province in the Visayas in 2013) on record and in the Marikeno memory.
“This September and months hence, Filipinos are on owl watch not only of the season’s rainfall but more of the evil that perpetuates the floods.”
As the local government marked the 16th anniversary of Ondoy today, it can brag about the rainbow at the end of the storm. The city bounced back slowly but surely, with a more lively business scene, laudable government services, and a constituent community with strong bayanihan spirit and pride.
There’s still flooding being a valley where rain easily cascades from the Sierra Madre mountains and gravel silt from an uptown province blocks the flow but it has dramatically ebbed this year due to an efficient flood management system now in place. The river is dredged of all trash, round-the-clock, which then gets loaded to a stationed truck that transports it regularly to a particular land site. A high stone wall was also built between the river and the park, houses, and business establishments alongside which spans about two kilometers.
FORTUNE ON FLOODS
This September and months hence, Filipinos are on owl watch not only of the season’s rainfall but more of the evil that perpetuates the floods.
That flood control corruption unfolding before our unbelieving eyes and aching hearts! Now, we get to pause and fully understand why there is flooding some months of each year, no longer just because our country is archipelagic, that our people are resilient and can survive, and so that God will spring a rainbow after a storm.
The connivance of political leaders (mainly senators and congressmen), the Department of Public Works and Highways,engineers and contractors to make colossal fortunes from allowing people’s misery instead of solving it is unimaginableand unforgettable.
How they tricked and harmed us with sub-standard and ghost projects from the public funds!
They’re the ones deserving to drown in the flood of corruption, I muse. In reality though, they should be jailed, their stolen billions transferred to public service needs, their grandiose luxuries stripped off, their ego crushed.