Disaster planning was faulty

If the government’s civil defense office was a private corporation required by the SEC to do risk assessment, lahar danger should have been one of those risks listed down and plans to mitigate its danger planned for. It is obvious government’s disaster planning for Super Typhoon Reming (international code name: Durian) was faulty. The systems need to be improved.

I know this will sound like Monday morning quarterbacking, but it has to be said. Someone calling the shots somewhere forgot that there was a lot of lahar on the slopes of Mt. Mayon due to eruptions early this year. Villages on the slopes and the foot of the volcano should have been forcibly evacuated.

It isn’t as if we had no experience in this sort of thing. We should have learned our lesson from the Mt. Pinatubo experience. The lahar problem in Pampanga and Tarlac happened after the rains washed down the volcanic debris during the rainy season that followed the eruption.

There seems to be no institutional memory with government. Someone should have added this reality about the lahar danger in government’s disaster "to do" list after the Pinatubo experience. The operations manual that the National Office of Civil Defense headed by the Acting Defense Secretary (which now happens to be Ate Glue), should have included the lahar danger and cascaded the proper procedure for dealing with it down to the local civil defense units in the endangered provinces like Albay. Obviously, no one did.

I am not looking for anyone to blame. It is just that we had a lot of time to prepare for this typhoon, as the Pagasa briefing carried live by ANC painfully made clear. Government had time to do something. Government’s disaster planning focused on everything from logistics to get relief goods to stricken areas, suspending classes at all levels, stopping maritime vessels from leaving ports and evacuating those in low lying areas in danger of flooding. It is as if the bureaucrats are doing everything by rote… here’s another typhoon… take folder "A" and follow the protocol.

No one remembered to evacuate residents on the slopes of Mayon because they were in no danger of being flooded. Nature taught us a lesson, for the second time in recent memory. Our disaster preparedness manuals must be urgently updated this time, lest we forget again. That tragedy of possibly a thousand people dying was totally preventable, if only the Philippine Institute of Volcanology or Phivolcs issued the lahar warning as soon as Pagasa or the weather bureau issued the typhoon warning.

After we locate the dead and give them a proper burial, an inquiry on why the bureaucracy failed so badly is called for… just so it doesn’t happen again.

Pork and Reming

Here’s a comment from reader Alex Ariza.

In the terrible aftermath of Super Typhoon Reming, faces and names of local political leaders of the ravaged areas are once again being flashed all over TV, radio and newspapers begging for assistance to their constituents.

Perhaps these politicians will find public reaction to be a little warmer if they all pledge to give all their pork barrel for the next five years (assuming they get re-elected of course) to aid the rehabilitation of their respective areas. And to make sure there will be no " hao-shao " they will channel said pork barrel via the Red Cross or other credible NGOs.

Royalty on Malampaya

Sen. Sergio Osmeña III texted me to react to our column last Friday that reported on the call of Oscar Lopez for government to lower royalties on Malampaya gas as a means of bringing down power rates. Osmeña pointed out "zero royalty is levied on copper, gold and other ores and minerals except natural gas and nickel. Does not make sense."

This was also the observation made by journalist Raissa Robles of the South China Morning Post in a question she posed to Mr. Lopez during that forum of the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP) where Mr. Lopez made his proposal. Robles opined that natural gas is more deserving of zero royalty than mining.

It is a position that Sen. Osmeña also takes. "All those mining companies displace people, destroy the environment and take our mineral wealth and all they brag is that they pay income taxes. Not enough because of a huge loophole known as transfer pricing."

The senator also echoed the observation made by Mr. Lopez that "the important argument for lower taxes and royalties on indigenous sources of fuel is that our neighbors in Asia charge almost zero royalty on fuels sold domestically. Royalties only levied on exported fuels."

It is certainly time for Congress to take action on this as a matter that deserves higher priority than Cha-cha, simply because the impact on the ordinary Filipino is immediate. But who in his right mind still believes our political leaders give a damn about the needs of the Filipino people? They are too worried about their term limits to do us any good.

Tio Paeng

It was with deep sadness that I received the news of the passing of former BSP Governor Paeng Buenaventura. Lovingly called Tio Paeng by a number of economic reporters, the former BSP Chief was among a rare breed of public servants who didn’t have airs, was competent and was easily accessible to the press.

A text message early Thursday morning last week, informed me that he slipped into a coma but his heart was still strong. I didn’t realize later that day that my good friend quickly passed away at mid-afternoon.

But true to his inclination to be low key, Tio Paeng left instructions that he be cremated immediately and after a simple private mass, be interred into a crypt at his San Antonio parish church in Forbes. He said he came into this world unnoticed and prefers to exit it the same way. It is very Paeng of him to be uneasy about the fuss his family and friends would have to make in a traditional wake. Tio Paeng was a class act to the end.

Paeng presided over the Bangko Sentral in one of the more turbulent moments of our nation’s history. One of the best achievements of Paeng is defending the independence of the Bangko Sentral from the politicians. His professionalism was well recognized. He received top honors and international acclaim, having been named one of the top 3 Central Bankers worldwide rated "A" for two successive years by Global Finance magazine.

Even as most of his banking career was spent with big banks here and abroad, Paeng’s pet cause while he was governor was promoting micro finance. He believed that the poor are not only credit worthy, giving them access to credit is an effective anti-poverty measure. His concern for the "small people" was noted by Business Week, which named him one of the leaders at the forefront of change in Asia.

One of the things that Tio Paeng worked so hard on during his watch that should be continued with all vigor by his successor is the effort to develop a domestic capital market. Its absence is one reason why our economic growth is not as robust as that of our neighbors, he observed. We are unable to finance basic infrastructure projects on our own and long term ventures in the private sector must go abroad for financing. Yet, if the pre-need firms are any indication, we have the capacity to save… which can and should be harnessed for big projects if we had a good capital market.

Tio Paeng often told us that a good domestic capital market is needed to give us the capacity to sustain our economic development. We need two strong pillars, Tio Paeng explained, to build a modern financial infrastructure that can mobilize our domestic savings to fund development.

A country with a healthy banking system and a deep and efficient domestic capital market can be compared, he said, to a jet plane that flies better on two engines rather than on one. Right now, over 98 percent of the financing needs of the economy are dependent on the banking system.

His brother, Cesar, texted me to say that "if people ask you what they can do in Paeng’s memory, may I suggest donations to UP College of Medicine Class of 1983 Foundation Inc. (c/o Dante Dator) or Friends of PGH. They will set up fund for poor cancer patients in Paeng’s memory."

One and only

Here is something from birthday boy, Dr. Ernie E.

He looked deep into the eyes of the woman he loves and said, "My heart is broken. I saw you with another man yesterday."

"Oh don’t be silly!" she replied, "That was just my husband. You know there is no one but you."

Boo Chanco ‘s e-mail address is [email protected]