Bunkhouses at Clark `contaminated' site torn down

CLARK FIELD, Pampanga - The Mt. Pinatubo Commission (MPC) has started to demolish 56 bunkhouses at an evacuation center here which about 20,000 lahar-displaced families used to occupy and where shallow wells are believed contaminated with toxic wastes left by the Americans at this former US air base.

MPC executive director Art Sampang said nine of the 56 concrete and wooden bunkhouses have already been torn down.

"We will declare the evacuation center permanently closed as soon as we have completed the dismantling of the remaining bunkhouses," Sampang said.

The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) estimated that some 20,000 families affected by Mt. Pinatubo's eruption in 1991 had lived at one time or another at the center.

The People's Task Force on Bases Cleanup (PTFBC) has recorded the deaths of at least 80 evacuees who had stayed there, mostly caused by heart ailments and various types of cancer which, the group believes, could have been triggered by toxic wastes.

Despite studies showing that oil, grease, mercury and nitrites are present in water from shallow wells at the evacuation center, hundreds of families earlier refused to leave until the MPC had assured them of permanent resettlement.

Sampang said the MPC has relocated 197 of about 200 families from the evacuation center. They were moved to the Madapdap resettlement in Mabalacat and to the Pandakaki housing project of the National Housing Authority (NHA) in Mexico town.

He said the NHA allocated 1,200 housing units and 800 lots for Pinatubo victims last December. The units were distributed to families in the MPC's priority list, particularly those whose houses were buried by lahar and who lost their livelihood due to the Mt. Pinatubo eruption.

Sampang said the remaining 56 families here will be transferred to Madapdap and Pandakaki housing sites not later than March.

"Some parents have asked me to postpone their transfer until after the schoolyear ends to enable their children to qualify for top honors in nearby schools," Sampang said.

But Sampang said the families have been told not to get water from shallow wells in the area. The Clark Development Corp. (CDC) will continue to provide them with safe water, he added.

The resettlement of Pinatubo victims has remained one of the priorities of the MPC whose term expires in December this year. Some 6,000 lahar-displaced families are still awaiting permanent resettlement.

The MPC, created in 1992, has already resettled about 49,000 families in 23 sites in Pampanga, Tarlac and Zambales.