Submerged CAMSUR town appeals for help

BATO, Camarines Sur (July 31, 2011) – This lake-side town is in need of immediate help as most of its barangays remain under up to meter-high water days after Typhoon Juaning has left.

On Friday (July 29) Bato Mayor Jeanette OR. Bernaldez urgently appealed for help for the 44,000 residents mostly dependent on planting root-crops, palay, and tilapia raising at Lake Bato. The town sustained the most damage among the 7 Rinconada towns in the worst flooding in the past 10-years, Bernaldez said.

With the town's calamity fund over-stretched for relief distribution, the Mayor appealed for donations of housing materials, food and potable water.

About 580 houses were destroyed by flash floods and potable water is on short supply because the pipes connecting the town's water system, BARIWASA, to the source in Barangay Masuli were destroyed.

Governor L-Ray Villafuerte has sent packages of relief goods and potable water but these were not enough, Mayor Bernaldez said.

Six days ago heavy rains and flash floods caused by Juaning submerged most of the 33 villages in this town that is immediately adjacent to the province of Albay that is also flood-ravaged. In some areas water levels reached up to six feet. But 4 days after Juaning left, flood waters have not receded in 20 lake-side villages near the town center forcing 2,862 persons to remain cramped in evacuation centers.

Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction Management (MDRRM) officer Carlos R. Elevado said 6,975 families, or about 39,200 persons of the town’s 44,400 population, lack food, potable water and dry place to sleep, putting them at risk of water-borne diseases.

The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) Bicol River Flood Forecasting Center in Camaligan said in an advisory that flood waters from the third district of Albay follow a flow pattern of emptying into the catch basin towns of Camarines Sur, including Bato.

Even after the rains have stopped, flood waters still submerge some areas not only in Bato but also in the second district towns of Minalabac, Milaor, Gainza, Camaligan and San Fernando and are expected to take more than a week to recede.

The town has been without electricity since July 25 and only a few stores have opened to sell basic goods.

The town's major roads are just starting to be cleared of debris and almost a hundred make-shift transferable nipa dwellings called “ara-alsa” are scattered all over the villages of Tres-Reyes and Sta. Cruz.

Bato Lake is believed to have shallowed over the years resulting in faster accumulation and longer retention of flood water in the areas surrounding it. A dredging project is ongoing and Mayor Bernaldez blames the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) for the delay in its implementation. A dredging equipment owned by the DPWH appears abandoned along the lake's bank.

Reportedly, Gov. L-Ray Villafuerte released P3-Million in 2009 for the repair the dredging machine and local sources here claim that over P100-million was already released as Congressional fund for the dredging project, which the DPWH is allegedly failing to implement.

Bernaldez added that the initial loss to agriculture and fisheries is estimated at over P30 million, which given the current condition of this town will take years to recover.

The Chief Meteorological officer of PAGASA station at the Central Bicol State University of Agriculture (CBSUA), Alfredo Consulta, said that “Juaning” recorded unusually high 252 millimeters of rainfall on July 25 and about 304 millimeters on July 26, resulting in massive flooding of the provinces of Camarines Sur and Albay. (With reports from Sonny Sales)