Big waves leave scores homeless

CEBU, Philippines - Huge waves spawned by the southwest monsoon and the after effects of tropical depression Jolina yesterday battered coastal areas in Cebu and destroyed flimsy seafront homes that left at least a hundred families in Talisay City homeless.

Most of the affected areas were in the coastal barangays of Dumlog and Poblacion in that city.

Talisay City social welfare officer Felipa Solana said the number could go higher as the raging seas have not shown any signs of letting up.

The early figures released by her office represented only areas in Dumlong already surveyed by her staff.

Linda Aranas, 56, whose house was reportedly the first to be destroyed, said big waves repeatedly slammed into her home made largely of bamboo until it got smashed.

She said that had she and her son not decided to flee, they would have been smashed along with their house.

Aranas, a widow, blamed the city government for not putting up a seawall to protect the densely populated area along the seafront despite a promise made some three years ago.

That promise was made, she said, because more that a hundred houses were similarly smashed by big waves at the time.

Her neighbors, Aurelia Das and Ronnie Sabequil, shared the same sentiments and said that if only the city government made good on its promise to build the seawall, they would not have suffered the destruction of their homes.

Sabequil also saw his home vanish yesterday.

Another neighbor, Richelle dela Calzada, whose house was already being lashed by the rampaging waters, asked her husband to voluntarily take their house down so they might still save some of it, rather than have the waves smash it and take every piece out to sea.

"It is better for us to tear our house down by ourselves than wait for the waves to destroy and wash everything away, leaving us with nothing to salvage," she said in Cebuano.

Efforts by members of the community to pile sandbags to keep away the rush of water proved futile against the forces of nature.

Dumlog barangay captain Charles Basillote said he went to the Capitol last month to ask for more bags of cement to complete a seawall project in his barangay but was told to liquidate liquidate first the 2,644 bags of cement the Capitol gave in 2007 for the project.

Basilotte said he was not aware that such a number of cement was given, which he said would have been sufficient to complete the project.

Basillote said he checked with the Talisay City Hall but was told by Mayor Socrates Fernandez to check with the city engineering office, which in turn could not provide him with any concrete answer.

When he went back to Fernandez, the mayor told him the items were already being liquidated.

Basillote said he later learned that the 2,644 bags of cement were part of more than 5,000 bags of cement provided by Garcia for the seawall project she promised.

On January 11 last year, Garcia, with Fernandez and Basillote, inaugurated the planned 420-meter-long seawall project.

But Sabequil said more than a year has passed and only that first phase, about 300 meters, of the seawall, which protects a private resort and a new housing project development was finished and did not reach the area where they are as promised.

But one resident said the 300-meter-long seawall, repaired after it was also destroyed by waves, could not have consumed all the 5,000 bags of cement.

The city engaged contractors to do repairs and construction of the seawall but Basillote could not say if any or both used the Capitol-donated cement.

Disaster officials reported that the whole Central Visayas will continue to experience cloudy skies and occasional rains with winds due to tropical depression Jolina and the southwest Monsoon.

Huge waves also pummeled large parts of Negros Oriental.

Bohol and Siquijor only suffered cloudy skies with occasional rains although seas in Siquijor have been reported to be rough and small seacraft were not allowed to sail.

In Mactan, four Taiwanese were rescued in the Hilutungan Channel yesterday morning when the outrigger they leased to go scuba diving capsized in rough seas. --- With Niña G. Sumacot, Ferliza Contratista/JST (THE FREEMAN)