Rainy season starts today

I was a bit hesitant when my editor-in-chief first asked me to write a column. I told him that with all my responsibilities in the newsroom, I wouldn't have time to write a column, which is really true by the way. I succeeded in convincing him at that time. When he brought up the idea once again, I found myself saying yes just to quiet him down. I thought to myself that I could always just find an excuse to postpone my column's debut.

My first alibi was the column title, I had to think and do research about the title. After the opinion editor gave me enough time to think and "research" about a title, my new excuse was that I didn't have a recent picture. When that excuse expired, I said I didn't have a topic in mind yet. I was busy with the election coverage, I have a string of meetings, I had to write memos, the excuses went on and I succeeded in postponing the column writing for almost a month! And then I ran out of excuses. But by then I already had a column title and bits and pieces of ideas for a topic. So here it is.

According to the American Heritage Dictionary, sidebar is a short, often boxed auxiliary news story that is printed alongside a longer article and that typically presents additional, contrasting, or late-breaking news. I named my column sidebar because this would be my chance to express my views on the news stories printed in the news pages of The Freeman. Maybe I could even write about juicy matters that cannot be printed in the news pages! But I promise though that I would not be doing lengthy discussions on issues because a sidebar, according to the dictionary, is something that is short.

First on my list of topics is the coming of the rainy season. Oh sure everyone was just too relieved to welcome the rains, what with that summer heat we all had to bear with! But the coming of the rainy season signals not just the end of summer heat but also the start of a whole lot of other problems such as floods, landslides and diseases.

These three problems that come about when the rains start are nothing new to us. These problems bug the public and even the government every year! But even then, these matters still remain as problems and nothing has been done to completely get rid of these headaches. I think this is because the public and the government are both reactive and not proactive.

Take the problem on flooding for example. It is known to us and to government officials that there are certain areas that are easily flooded when there is a heavy downpour. What has been done about this? Government answer: There are personnel tasked to clean canals, creeks and esteros to ensure that rainwater will not flood these areas. But when do these personnel start cleaning the canals, creeks and esteros? My answer: Cleaning starts when the rains come or when an area is already flooded and there are complaints from the public. Nobody does any cleaning during the summer when the rains are still a month or two away.

It is also the same for the problems on landslides and diseases. People living in landslide prone areas only leave the area when a landslide has already occurred. They do not heed the warnings of authorities. When it comes to diseases meanwhile, the cleaning of surroundings are only done when there are already reported cases of a disease.

The rains will always come at this time of the year and it will always bring along problems on flooding, landslides and diseases. Until and unless the government and the public will do something to prevent the said problems it will continue to hound us and claim lives in the process. We can all do something and stop these matters from being problems or we could all just blame these problems on the rain.

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