Ilonggos troop to centers gathering aid for ‘Sendong’ victims

ILOILO CITY—Seventy-four-year-old Ernesto Lioro came with four plastic bags filled with old clothes Wednesday morning. He went home and returned two hours later with two more.

“I don’t know anyone in Mindanao… I just want to help the flood victims,” he told staff members of radio station Bombo Radyo in Iloilo before turning teary-eyed.

Lioro was among the throngs of Ilonggos who came to donation centers and collection points in this city for assistance to victims of Tropical Storm “Sendong,” particularly those in the flood-ravaged cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan in northern Mindanao.

Moved by images and tales of destruction, death and despair, hundreds have poured into radio and television stations including Aksyon Radyo, Radyo Mo Nationwide, GMA and ABS-CBN to donate all forms of goods and cash.

Some came in pedicabs, bicycles and tricycles. Others rode cars, taxicabs or brought goods in trucks. Many arrived on foot while some took passenger boats from Guimaras Island.

Dorothy Aynaga, 31, from Barangay Trapiche in Oton town in Iloilo went to the Bombo-Iloilo station with her 4-year-old daughter Joycel Marie Wednesday noon with a large box filled with used clothing that she and her mother and sister collected.

“We all saw their situation and it’s heartbreaking to see everything they had washed out. Kaluluoy gid sa ila (They’re so pitiful),” she told the INQUIRER.

Cluvita Fasin, 56, of Barangay Sto. Niño Sur in Villa Arevalo District in Iloilo City said she was from Agusan del Sur. She talked with her husband Roberto and they decided to bring around 50 pieces of old clothes to Bombo Radyo’s Oplan Tabang (Help) campaign.

“If it happened to us, we would also be desperate for any help,” she said.

Maximo Fernandez of Jaro District had planned a family trip to General Santos City but the trip was canceled. He decided to use more than P16,000 allotted for the trip to buy boxes of canned goods, detergents and candies.

In many communities and neighborhoods, residents were gathering whatever they can to send to the flood victims.

Elvina Fuego came with two boxes of used clothes, one of which was given by her neighbor in Barangay Airport in Mandurriao District in Iloilo City.

“We were spared so we should help those who suffered most,” she said.

Nenen Barnuevo, a staff member of Bombo Radyo-Iloilo, said most of the donations consisted of old clothes, bottled water, noodles and sardines.

One donor brought a box of detergent bars “to help them wash away the mud on their things.”

Many donors wanted to remain anonymous and declined to give their names even just for record purposes.

Some donors were residents of Jaro District in Iloilo City and Pavia town in Iloilo who were also victims of massive floods spawned by Typhoon “Frank” in 2008.

The donations will be shipped Thursday via a Negros Navigation vessel for Cagayan de Oro City.

Help is also pouring in from the Visayan provinces of Northern Samar and Cebu.

In Northern Samar, the local government units and civic organizations are sending donations to flood victims in Iligan and Cagayan de Oro cities.

Each member of the Rotary Club of Catarman contributed cash and goods in response to the Rotary Cagayan’s call for relief assistance for the calamity areas.

Mayor Andre Abalon of San Roque in Northern Samar asked the town council’s finance committee to allot at least 10,000 cash donation for the same purpose.

In Cebu, the provincial government pledged to donate a P12-million financial assistance fund for Iligan and Cagayan as well as Tanjay and Dumaguete cities in Negros Oriental which also suffered devastation caused by Sendong.

Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia said P5 million each would be given to Iligan and Cagayan while P1 million each would be donated to Tanjay and Dumaguete.

Other towns in Cebu also promised to provide financial assistance.

Liloan town would give P200,000 each to Cagayan de Oro and Iligan while Asturias town pledged P100,000 each.

Garcia said she would send the province-owned heavy equipment and personnel to help in the clearing operations in Cagayan de Oro and Iligan.

Aside from the financial assistance, the Cebu provincial government shipped relief goods to the victims of Sendong both in the Visayas and Mindanao via Carlos A. Gothong Lines. These included 100,000 pieces of bottled water, 3,000 bags of NFA rice, 200 cartons of sardine cans, 40 boxes of noodles and 40 boxes of medicine.

Help may also come from the House of Representatives.

Speaker Feliciano Belmonte has asked from each solon to give a donation of P20,000 from their personal funds for the victims of Sendong, said Rep. Pablo John Garcia of Cebu’s 3rd district.

With P20,000 from each of the 285 congressmen, the House would be able to raise about P5.6 million, said Rep. Garcia.

“As far as organizing fund raising is concerned, I think there are enough … Cebuano officials will continue to give as long as it is needed,” he said.

Rep. Eduardo Gullas of Cebu’s 1st district, whose family owns the University of the Visayas, tasked all deans of UV to ask their students to donate, either in cash or in kind, to the typhoon victims. UV is one of the biggest universities in Cebu. (With reports from Rachel Arnaiz and Carmel Matus)