5 February – While it’s been almost two months since typhoon Sendong devastated most of the communities in Iligan City and most of the survivors have now returned to their homes from evacuation centers, relief and assistance continues as Duyog Iligan: Tri-People Solidarity for Sendong Survivors volunteers deliver food as well as non-food items to various affected villages.

Partnering with the Humanitarian Resource Consortium (HRC), Plan International, Save the Children, Coalition of Licensed Agencies for Domestics and Service Workers (CLADS), Development and Peace Integrated Pastoral Development Initiative (IPDI), and La Salle High School-Iligan, the Ranaw Disaster Response and Rehabilitation Assistance Center (RDRRAC) reached out to affected residents of Iligan City.

Following the home-based distribution in Brgy. Tibanga, Brgy. Ubaldo Laya and Brgy. Bagong Silang on January 17, 2011, the relief and distribution team reached out to two (2) evacuation centers and eight (8) communities which have a total of one thousand three hundred fourteen (1,314) evacuation center-based as well as home-based households from January 23, 2011 to February 5, 2012.

Evacuation Centers

The Laville Evacuation Center in Brgy. Tubod is the adopted evacuation camp of the RDRRAC-Duyog Iligan since December 26, 2011; catering to the needs of the evacuees by engaging them as partners in putting up mechanisms of camp management. These mechanisms ensure proper delivery of relief goods and services by various donors. Through the partnership with the Humanitarian Resource Consortium (HRC), Plan International, Save the Children, Coalition of Licensed Agencies for Domestics and Service Workers (CLADS), the relief and distribution team was able to deliver one hundred ten (110) packs consisting of hygiene kit, flashlight, malong, bath and detergent soaps, bathing and cooking materials on January 23, 2012.

Meanwhile, forty-eight (48) households catered at the Ubaldo Laya evacuation center were given sleeping mat, blanket and mosquito net from the Integrated Pastoral Development Initiative (IPDI); flash light, malong, bath soap and laundry soap from Plan International.

Home-Based

Most of the served internally-displaced persons were home-based in their communities or those who have returned from evacuation centers to start rebuilding their lives since the typhoon hit the city. Since most of the relief operations focused primarily in the evacuation areas, the RDRRAC-Duyog Iligan decided to address also the staggering needs of the home-based survivors as well.

A total of one hundred and three (103) households in Purok Manuang, Ubaldo Laya; seven hundred seventy-eight (778) households in Purok 1, Purok Orchids, Purok 2-A, Purok 2-B, Purok 2-C and Purok 4-A of Brgy. Santiago; one hundred ninety-seven (197) households in Brgy. Mahayahay and three hundred twenty-nine (329) households in Purok Orchids, Brgy. Santiago.

Pursuing a rights-based approach in relief and rehabilitation assistance, the Ranaw Disaster Relief and Rehabilitation Assistance Center (RDRRAC) through its Duyog Iligan campaign continues to gain support and partnership from humanitarian organizations as well as the local government unit to ensure proper distribution of goods and services to the affected communities.

Matet Norbe, RDRRAC-Duyog Iligan

 IDPs mobilize for representation

04 February – Iligan City- In pursuing a participatory and consultative humanitarian response to Sendong survivors and internally-displaced persons (IDPs), the interim group from the IDP Consultative Forum held last January 26, 2012 gathered at the College of Arts and Social Sciences of the Mindanao State University-IIT to discuss the need for representation in the decision-making processes with regards to planning and implementation of early recovery and rehabilitation programs of the government.

The small group is composed of eleven representatives coming from seven urban as well as coastal areas identified to temporarily lead the formation of an IDP advocacy group which they decided to call Iligan Survivors Movement which will be composed of all IDPs in Iligan City. The movement will particularly aim to lobby for representation in the Humanitarian Response Clusters led by the government with partnership from United Nations organizations as well as non-government organizations. These are the clusters of (1) Camp Coordination and Camp Management, (2) Shelter, (3) Livelihood, (4) Water, Sanitation and Hygiene or WASH, and (5) Women and Child Protection.

The creation of the Iligan Survivors Movement was brought about by the findings of the IDP Consultative Forum which saw the imbalanced distribution of relief and assistance where most home-based survivors were left out; the outpour of relief and assistance from non-government organizations and international non-government organizations vis-a-vis that of local government support; information gap between the government and the IDPs on shelter and relocation issues as well as other top-level decisions that led to IDPs defining themselves as just but victims who only receive relief and assistance without considering also their voices in the decision-making regarding their present as well as future needs.

Ma. Gittel Saquilabon of the Duyog Iligan: Tri-People Solidarity for Sendong Survivors of the Ranaw Disaster Response and Rehabilitation Assistance Center (RDRRAC), as one of the agencies facilitating the empowerment of Sendong IDPs in the city shared that the organization together with the MSU-IIT Office of the Vice Chancellor for Planning and Development and the College of Art and Social Sciences is glad that finally “the IDPs have started organizing themselves to push for and assert their agenda to the proper decision-making bodies so that they themselves can have a voice and participation in their early recovery and rehabilitation.”

Matet Norbe, RDRRAC-Duyog Iligan

 DA Sec Alcala addresses food-related disaster woes

03 February – Iligan City More than a month after typhoon Sendong (Washi) hit the city, the Philippine Department of Agriculture finally addresses the plight of farmers and fisherfolks whose primary source of livelihood was gravely-devastated by the calamity.

Secretary Prospero J. Alcala together with regional director and local government officials met with the Alliance of Sustainable Agriculture Practitioners (ASAP), a convergence of among non-government organizations and peoples organizations in Iligan City, Lanao Del Norte, and Misamis Occidental on February 2, 2011 at the MSU-IIT Cooperative function hall and discussed the possible engagement with the Department of Agriculture in the implementation of the Rehabilitation Program to Sendong (Washi)-affected agricultural sector in hinterlands and coastal areas of Iligan City.

ASAP presented their identified subjects for future engagements as farm tools and equipment assistance; technology assistancein diversified integrated farming system, post-harvest handling technology and marketing; farm inputs; livestock and poultry replacement; aqua- fisheries support; comprehensive agro-forestry and watershed management; and clearing and repair of access roads to sixteen agricultural areas in the hinterlands as well as in the coasts. These areas include but not limited to the barangays of Mandulog, Lanipao, Dulag, Panoroganan, Kalilangan, Mainit, Rogongon, Digkilaan, Bonbonon, Tipanoy, Abuno, Pugaan, Santiago, Hinaplanon, Sta. Felomina, and Tambacan. ASAP members already initiated immediate response to the needs of the farmers in some of these areas but financial constraints limited the group’s intervention.

Mark Mandar of the Alliance of Sustainable Agriculture Practitioners (ASAP) presenting the possible future engagements with the Department of Agriculture
To which, the secretary assured his department’s support and cooperation in bringing about rehabilitation mechanisms to ensure the early as well as sustainable recovery of the city’s agricultural areas and sectors. A public-private-CSO partnership is on the wrap with a planning meeting that will be held on February 3, 2011 with the Department of Agriculture and the Alliance of Sustainable Agriculture Practitioners. Meanwhile, the Secretary urged the civil society organizations to continue being the watchdogs on logging, mining as well as other environmentally-destructive activities for the mitigation of climate change that has equally devastating effects to the sustainable agriculture productivity as well as national development.

The forum on agriculture rehabilitation plan was mainly facilitated by the Pailig Development Foundation, Inc. with the support of other ASAP members like the Ranaw Disaster Response and Rehabilitation Assistance Center (RDRRAC, Inc.), Sumpay Mindanao, Inc. ,Panaghugpong sa mga Mag-uuma ug Kabus sa Kabanikanhan alang sa Kausaban, Inc.(PASAKA), Kalipunan ng mga Maliliit na Magniniyog sa Pilipinas (KAMMPIL), Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Federation of Misamis Occidental (CAFEMO), Barangay Inagongan Farmers Association (BIFA), Iligan City Agri-Fisheries Council (ICAFC), Social Action Center (Iligan), Lanao Alliance of Human Rights Advocates (LAHRA), and Ecosystems Work for Essential Benefits, Inc. (ECOWEB).

Matet Norbe, RDRRAC-DUYOG Iligan