Tuesday, October 21, 2008 Editorials: Flooded Sitio Dakit
BETTER safe than sorry is obviously the principle followed by Acting Mayor Michael Rama and the Cebu City Development Council (CCDC) in implementing the evacuate-at-night policy for residents of Sitio Dakit in Barangay Guadalupe.
The area suffers flooding every time torrential rains fall, or at least that was what happened in the two instances that the suffering of Sitio Dakit caught media attention.
In both cases also, the failure of Landco Development Corp. to put up flood mitigating measures on the mountainside above Sitio Dakit was blamed for the flow of water with silt and limestone, covering some of the houses in the area.
Expert suggestion
Rama, though, wants to be sure, although one can say that Sitio Dakit was not flooded like this before Landco “developed” the area above it and before the already relatively bald mountainside was scraped mercilessly by the firm’s heavy equipment.
Admittedly, a study by an expert, like a geologist, can provide a scientific guidance to what is otherwise City Hall’s “oido” approach to solving the problem.
Note that after the first major flooding incident in Sitio Dakit, Landco was ordered to put up flood mitigating structures and then was apparently left on its own by City Hall and barangay officials until the second flooding caught them off-guard again.
Although some houses were damaged in both instances, concerned officials can thank their lucky stars no life was lost or public criticism would have been harsher.
Lessons
Hopefully Rama and CCDC people, together with Guadalupe barangay officials led by its chief, Eugenio Faelnar, have learned their lessons this time around and won’t loosen up on the monitoring of the putting up of flood mitigating measures.
Faelnar merits special mention because he may have been so distracted by his word war with Rep. Antonio Cuenco and by his other extra-curricular activities that he may have overlooked the need to constantly check on the situation of Sitio Dakit folk.
Past experiences with land development projects show that if firms are allowed to do things on their own they always give the least priority on drainage and flood prevention structures to save on construction costs.
That’s why non-nonsense monitoring and imposition of harsh penalties for every violation should be done by government officials concerned.
