With power and communication facilities still out of order, the City of Bayawan on Monday started picking up the pieces wrought by the worst flooding in history resulting from heavy monsoon rains.
Floodwaters subsided enabling thousands of evacuees to return to their homes. With rescue operations called off, efforts have now shifted to relief and recovery.
The bodies of a police officer, PO1 Rodilyn Gonzaga and a still-unidentified octogenarian, had been recovered Monday morning. Five remained missing as of 12 noon.
Bayawan City, a grand slam winner in the Gawad Kalasag Awards for its disaster management programs, was practically at a loss in addressing the flooding, which isolated the City from the rest of Negros Oriental.
Mayor German Sarana Jr., in a meeting with the City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council Monday morning, said priority would be given to helping the people.
Strong rains also threatened to inundate Dumaguete City as well as the towns of Sibulan and Siaton, but the dikes and other river control measures effectively prevented the raging rivers of these threatened areas from causing damage.
Negros Oriental Governor Roel Degamo took the opportunity to appeal to President Benigno Aquino III to release the P480 million balance of the calamity fund which had been earmarked for the repair of infrastructure damaged by Tropical Storm Sendong.
In an interview, Degamo said that many Negrenses were spared from the floods in Dumaguete City and Siaton town as a result of the construction of river dikes and river dredging and rechanneling projects undertaken by his administration with the initial release of P480 million last year.
The Province had identified projects totaling P960 million, which would repair the damage wrought by Sendong. The Department of Budget and Management then transmitted the initial amount of P480 million but followed it up with a Negative Special Allotment Release Order, indicating that it was getting back the money. The DBM said the fund release did not follow certain required procedures.
The Commission on Audit also issued a Notice of Disallowance, late last year, on the contracts entered into by the Province with the contractors in relation to this fund.
Instead of returning the money, the Province of Negros Oriental instead entered into contracts with contractors for projects totaling P960 million. Degamo said he ordered the spending of the money because this was a calamity fund and was meant to protect lives.
Provincial Engr. Franco Alpuerto said that the P480 million was paid to the contractors who accomplished 64 percent of the projects listed in the total budget of P960 million.
River dikes measuring 1.5 kilometers long had been set up along the Banica River in Dumaguete, the Ocoy River in Sibulan and in the Siaton River in Siaton town. “If not for these dikes, the monsoon rains would have caused more damage to life and property,” Degamo said.
Degamo blamed the issuance of the Negative Saro on politics, as he was running against the President’s political ally in the May 2013 elections. “This is all politics, I can only see President Aquino pursuing the Tuwid na Daan but I can’t see it in the people below him,” Degamo said.
