Wednesday, October 22, 2008 Editorial: Park war and politics
DAVAO is expecting some barbs once more between its two most prominent politicians -- City Mayor Rodrigo R. Duterte and House Speaker Prospero C. Nograles -- over the newest bone of contention, a public park.
Nograles sees politics, as most politicians are seeing nowadays.
The hapless city official who unknowingly pulled the trigger that set out the outburst is retired Colonel Yusop Jimlani, head of the city's drainage maintenance unit (DMU). Jimlani has led the demolition of the cemented Nograles Park at the Mini-Forest because he has a marching order to make sure Davao streets are drained of floodwaters as soon as possible.
Every Dabawenyo knows that the soonest possible during these rains can reach more than two hours, forcing hundreds to just the floodwaters just to make it home at night.
The Nograles Park, a strip of concrete and grass with some iron grills in the middle of the road that leads to the coastal residences in Mini-Forest, was built over the center canal several years back. It has been there since, with its name in cement, serving more like a giant center island than a park since it is but one long strip of ground raised from the pavement by as high as two feet and nothing else.
Major canals, like the one at Mini-Forest, are what drain water from the city's mainstreets to the gulf.
It's a fact that floods have become a fact whenever the heavy rain falls. It's a fact too that rain falls almost every afternoon in Davao City. But with the volume of water growing bigger and bigger, city streets have become the catchbasin of all these; the drainage system so old, they can barely hold water.
And then the park that stands right on top of a main drainage canal right in the middle of the road that leads to the coastal area of the Mini-Forest.
Any one, Dabawenyo or not, will find the choice easy between a park in the middle of a road and a drainage. Any one, Dabawenyo or not, who has been forced to shiver under dripping eaves unable to ride a jeepney home because floodwater has already covered the whole street will know drainage is a problem. Is politics in these choices? No.
Sometimes it helps if people, politicians especially, will look at the situation as they are and not see 2010 written in everything that is said and done. On the other hand, a little courtesy is always welcome. This world can't have enough of courteousness. But we have long known that judicious use of funds and courtesy are hard to come by in this part of the world.
In the meantime, let's expect more rains and maybe some floods as an intertropical convergence zone continues to affect the weather in Visayas and Mindanao while some people huff and puff over demolished parks built in the middle of a road on top of drainage canals.
