Marcos urged to sign land use bill into law

MANILA, Philippines — President Marcos should certify as urgent a “National Land-Use” bill in the House of Representatives and sign it into law the soonest to prevent the devastating effects of typhoons, an opposition lawmaker said yesterday.

“The tragic loss of lives and the widespread devastation caused by Tino once again expose the severe gaps in our national land-use planning and disaster risk management. We are paying the price for decades of policy inaction,” House Minority Leader Marcelino Libanan said.

House Bill 2130, authored by Deputy Minority Leader and ML party-list Rep. Leila de Lima, is one of the pending land-use bills in the chamber.

According to Libanan, “proper land-use planning is absolutely imperative for disaster risk reduction, climate resilience, and environmental integrity.”

“Proper land-use planning is a matter of survival in this era of brutal climate change. We must put an end to building communities in inherently unsafe areas – those prone to riverine and urban flooding, landslides, and coastal storm surges,” he added.

Libanan explained that the proposed National Land-Use Law will serve as the nation’s master framework for the allocation, utilization, management and development of lands and natural resources.

‘Worst flash flood’

Still reeling from the magnitude 6.9 earthquake that jolted the province late September, Cebu is now suffering from “the worst flash flood caused by a typhoon” in its history so far.

“In less than 10 minutes, the water rose dramatically,” Cebu Gov. Pamela Baricuatro said in an interview with “Headstart” on ANC on Wednesday, referring to the aftermath of Typhoon Tino (Kalmaegi).

“People didn’t have enough time to run, that’s why they all had to do was go to their roofs because it’s their only mode of survival,” she recalled.

With Super Typhoon Uwan battering the Bicol Region, a flash flood yesterday already inundated Barangay Masarawag in Guinobatan, Albay.

Flash floods pose considerable risk to all regions in the Philippines. The catastrophe occurs when heavy rainfall causes a “rapid rise of water in a river channel or the extreme flow of water over normally dry land,” Science and Technology Secretary Renato Solidum Jr. told The STAR in a message.

Marcelino Villafuerte II, Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration deputy administrator for research and development, further explained that excessive rains cause water to “fall on hills and mountains, rushing down into flood plains and urban areas through rivers and streams.”

Flash flood is a form of street-level flooding that can develop less than six hours after a heavy rainfall occurs.

The devastation can worsen when a storm surge, a form of coastal flooding, occurs. “It is the rapid rise of seawater pushed onshore by strong winds due to storms,” said Solidum.

Villafuerte told The STAR that the two concepts are different and, when they pounce, they come from opposite directions. Still, “they can occur at the same time, particularly where they met, which could even worsen the situation.”

A study published in September in the Tropical Cyclone Research and Review journal revealed that Central Luzon is the most susceptible to flash floods across the Philippines, with a recurrence rate of 10 percent, followed by Ilocos Region, Calabarzon and Mimaropa.

Scholars pinpoint artificial and human-induced factors as causes of significantly exacerbated flash floods.

Artificial factors include blasting, the construction of temporary dams, dike breaches and the sudden release of dams’ excess water, whereas poor land use planning, deforestation and improper waste management are human-caused activities that make matters worse.

Undersecretary Carlos Primo David of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) explained that Cebu’s inundation has demonstrated how impeding natural waterways results in the massive loss of life.

Meanwhile, Sen. Erwin Tulfo wants the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) to investigate reports of discrimination in the distribution of relief aid to Typhoon Tino victims in Cebu, citing complaints from residents who were allegedly wrongly labeled in relief forms. — EJ Macababbad, Neil Jayson Servallos