Gore and Loren in a docu film together?

HANOI — When we arrived in this capital city of Vietnam last Wednesday for the United Nations International Strategic Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) conference, Sen. Loren Legarda has prepared very well to perform for tasks related to her advocacy for climate change and adaptation measures. After all, she is the designated “regional champion” for the Asia-Pacific of the UNISDR. This has been Legarda’s role as spokesperson of the UNISDR for climate change mitigation and adaptation that she has been doing since December 2008 when she accepted this international commitment.

What Legarda has not prepared for, is the report she got from Jerry Velasquez, senior regional director-coordinator of the UNISDR for Asia-Pacific. She and former US Vice President Al Gore might soon be featured together in an international documentary feature. The UNISDR project dreams to put Gore for his global warming advocacy and Legarda in her championing for climate change would appear together in a feature documentary film.

The twin advocacies of Gore and Legarda would be put together by the UNISDR in a documentary film to bring across the globe the twin subject matters they wish world leaders and the whole humanity to pay attention to, before it’s too late.

Velasquez, who is the highest Filipino official in this specialized UN agency, reported to Legarda he has been working on this project headed by UNISDR director Salvano Briceno of Venezuela. He disclosed the UNISDR eyes to bring in Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono into this documentary film project because of his strong advocacy for adaptation measures for global warming and climate change.

In September 2009, the Indonesian leader addressed the G20 Leaders’ Summit held in Pittsburg that discussed the importance of a common agenda to tackle the severe impact of climate change that puts millions of people at risk. In that address before the heads of state of the most developed and rich nations, President Yudhoyono underscored the need to continue international discussions on how to cut carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions as the main source of global warming, and who should pay for it.

In fact, Velasquez cited, the Indonesian President will again push for his own climate change advocacy in the Global Platform Conference scheduled in Geneva on May 10 to 13. This will coincide in this year’s Leaders’ Summit of the Association of South East Asian Nations that Indonesia is chairing and will hold in Jakarta.    

The Indonesian President’s taking the lead in discussing climate change impact, Velasquez explained, is the cue for the UNISDR to enlist his help and put into reality the documentary film project. Through President Yudhoyono, he pointed out, the UNISDR could possibly course through their request for Gore to join Legarda to further drumbeat attention of the global community to this cause for humanity.  

Legarda was visibly stunned and her eyes could not hide the excitement upon hearing about this. Gore has already come up with his own Oscar award-winning “Inconvenient Truth” documentary film in 2006. The same documentary film also won for Gore the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his advocacy for climate change, specifically on disaster mitigation.   

The “Inconvenient Truth” talked about Gore’s campaign to educate citizens of the world about global warming via a comprehensive slide show that he has been presenting in his speaking engagements. The former US vice president used the documentary film to get the attention of the world and to warn them that global warming is a real threat to the existence of mankind and “the greatest challenge we’ve ever faced.”

On June 8 last year, Gore came to Manila where he presented an updated version of his “Inconvenient Truth” that now includes the most recent natural disasters that took place around the world. Gore’s updated opus has added typhoon Ketsana that left a swathe of devastation in the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Australia, and other neighboring countries in the Asia-Pacific region in September 2009. Ketsana, known under its local typhoon name Ondoy, brought in historic amounts of flashfloods and caused mudslides all over Metro Manila where scores of people were killed and massive damages to public and private properties.   

A former broadcast journalist herself before she turned to politics, Legarda was suddenly speechless for a few seconds after Velasquez broke this piece of news to her. “Why was I the last to know about this?” was all that Legarda could ask in riposte.

Actually, Velasquez confessed to her the UNISDR has been putting this documentary film project since the first time Legarda accepted her assignment as the “regional champion” for climate change in this part of the world.

So it has been a work in progress for almost three years now, Velasquez pointed out. Hopefully, he said, they could actualize this project before the year ends, citing the fact that the current UNISDR chief is set to retire this April after 15 years of heading this UN body.

While she may not have the international caliber of Gore’s documentary film, Legarda has produced her own environmental documentary entitled Tag-Ulan sa Tag-Araw based on Philippine experience with natural disasters. Noting the Filipino psyche to follow tele-novela, Legarda made use of the film medium to dramatize the severe effects of climate change to people in general and easier understanding in layman’s language on how global warming would drastically change their way of life.

A well-trained communicator, Legarda uses the resources of her office at her disposal to push her advocacy down to the grassroots. She chairs the newly organized Senate special committee on climate change and the congressional oversight committee on the Climate Change Commission. The CCC is a new government agency that was created by the law that Legarda principally authored in the previous 14th Congress. She also currently chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Legarda could only wish for this UNISDR documentary film project to get off the ground as soon as possible. Without the backing of the Indonesian President that the UNISDR hopes to get, the Gore-Legarda documentary film may just become a movie in her mind.