Especially when she found out that three of the missing persons whose names and photos were flashed on TV were found.
A lightbulb automatically flashed before her. Why don’t we turn this missing person segment into a full-blown show? We can help government and private groups reunite broken families, she convinced executives of then newly-reopened QTV 11 a year ago.
Jessica also had her own reason. It’s her way of paying forward to the people all the blessings her multi-awarded career has given her. And so Sana’y Muling Makapiling (SMM). Since it started airing on primetime (10 p.m., Tuesdays), the show has found 157 missing persons at the rate of three persons a week.
In the process, it has seen the tearful reunion of long-lost families. No other show is fraught with real-life drama as moving and touching as this.
An episode, for instance, focused on a taong grasa the SMM staff found aimlessly roaming the streets. A series of interviews showed that a nature-induced circumstance forced him to sink to such a lowly level of existence. The man is a survivor of the Bocaue tragedy in Leyte which claimed hundreds of lives, including those, he believed are his family’s.
Fear of loneliness and non-acceptance from his family kept the man from returning to his hometown. He was afraid his search would be futile and his family won’t accept him anymore after being away from them for years.
SMM aired his story and the family he was afraid was wiped out from the tragedy found out. They were only too happy to get him back. End of story.
There are other just as touching cases, many of which can move even the most jaded viewer to tears. A mother sobs uncontrollably while walking on her knees towards the door where waits her long-lost son. An incredulous father breaks down upon seeing the now-grown son he hasn’t seen for so long.
Most cases involve the very young and the very old. The very young usually get separated from their parents or older relatives in a crowded shopping place (imagine the dramatic increase in the number of missing persons this Christmas season). The staff has also returned a lost Mongoloid child to his parents.
The very old, on the other hand, are victims of Alzheimer’s disease and other illnesses that render them helpless and dependent on others.
Whatever it is, Jessica has discovered —- to her utter amazement – that try as they might to help find missing persons (their names are aired on the QTV newscast), the list gets longer and longer by the day.
Blame it on the total absence of a system in locating this people. The government only provides shelters for these missing persons. But it doesn’t have a means by which social workers, for instance, can find them.
Thus, SMM has devised its own system. The staff starts by looking over the COMELEC’s voting list or the National Statistics Office (NSO) records for data on the person: his address, family members, age, civil status, etc. The list has been most helpful so far, assures Jessica.
Then, they flash the missing person’s name and photo on air.
The public service program goes a step further by advising televiewers how they can avoid going through the horror of searching for a missing loved one. For instance, ff you have a little son or daughter, or even a young relative or friend, make sure the child’s name, address, and other pertinent information are attached somewhere on the clothes he or she is wearing.
In this season of harried Christmas shopping and crowded tiangges and malls, this piece of advice can make a difference between a happy get-together at home and a holiday full of tension and grief.