Let's help Iligan and Cagayan rise again

Last Wednesday, I went to the Mandulog River in Iligan. It was very peaceful and without a trace of Sendong.

Meanwhile, the children at East 2B Elementary School in Barangay Digkilaan were singing again.

DepEd Sec. Armin Luistro wanted to restore the sense of normalcy as soon as possible so he announced that classes should resume immediately. There were no lectures yet, but mostly singing and sharing of experiences.

In an interview with ANC anchor Karen Davila in Headstart, Bro. Armin said it was very painful to watch the children in areas affected by Sendong, do a headcount of their classmates and then to realize that their friends had died.

“The students are all accounted for,” said a teacher from Digkilaan 2B East Elementary School.

To have everyone present when classes resumed was the best consolation that the teachers and their students had despite losing their homes.

I did hope that things would be better when I visited Iligan again, and it lifted my spirits to hear children laugh so hard and participate in some parlor games before we proceeded with the distribution of school supplies. They were full of gratitude. There was no trace of bitterness in the children. But I was wrong to assume that they had gotten over Sendong so quickly. Hidden in the children’s laughter is the pain and the fear inside them. I found out about this when I asked them to draw using their new pencils and paper.

Ten-year-old Michael Angelo drew a very dark image. He sketched a village covered with water, with troso and people on their roof asking for help. He scribbled the word tulong. He told me that he couldn’t remember how many hours he and his family stayed on their roof, waiting for the water to subside.

It was perhaps no coincidence that a number of children who went through debriefing drew an image of a big boat. Some teachers explained that perhaps the boat symbolizes their desperate need for help during Typhoon Sendong. There is also an urban legend in different parts of Iligan that the residents saw a big boat in Mandulog River before the flooding happened.

The wounds that Sendong left in affected families run deep. Victims are going through depression and there were some reported cases of suicide already (an urgent appeal to my colleagues in media to be careful in reporting suicides, because the situation is highly vulnerable, prone to copycat syndrome.) Some psychologists flew to Cagayan to provide counseling and the Department of Health distributed anti-depressants. Add to this are the occurrence of Leptospirosis and the fear of Dengue to spread.

Families now live in tent cities through the help of foreign non-government organizations, but they are unsure until when they will remain there. Without homes and a livelihood, the victims are literally dependent on relief goods. (Thank God that people are still helping). A number of victims have started rebuilding their homes, unfortunately they chose to build in the very same place where their families were washed out by the Mandulog River.

Iligan needs help to rehabilitate the place. They need houses and livelihood. Let’s help them.

I have some good news.

In Cagayan, plans are underway to build houses for the victims of Sendong through Habitat for Humanity.

In Iligan, on the other hand, Gawad Kalinga will start building houses on the fourth week of January.

It will take years for Iligan and Cagayan to rise again, but it is not impossible. Thank you for the commitment to help the victims of Sendong. Thank you for bringing hope.

(E-mail me at [email protected].)