Slowly, life for Batangas folk returns to normal

CLEANING TIME A resident of Agoncillo town in Batangas province tries to get rid of thick ash that has covered the second floor of his house. Agoncillo and another town, Laurel, lifted their lockdown orders on Monday after volcanologists downgraded Taal’s alert level from 4 to 3 on Sunday. —MARIANNE BERMUDEZ

Apolinario Landicho, 70, on Monday headed straight to his farm, a five-minute walk from his home in Barangay Poblacion 3 in Laurel, Batangas province, to check on his pigs.

To Landicho, as to many other Batangas residents who collectively heaved a sigh of relief once towns were reopened after a two-week lockdown, the farm animals “were the priority [concern],” he said.

“I lost four pigs. Those that had just recently been weaned. Others were still alive but weak because of lack of food,” he said in a phone interview.

Landicho had about 200 pigs left behind when his family fled to Imus City, Cavite province, as soon as Taal Volcano began to show signs of unrest.

On Monday, the local governments of Laurel and Agoncillo were the last of the 14 Batangas towns and cities to reopen after the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology on Sunday lowered the volcano’s alert level from 4 to 3.

Danger zone

Agoncillo Mayor Daniel Reyes, in a phone interview, said the lockdown was lifted except for the villages of Bilibinwang, Subic Ilaya and Banyaga, which were inside the danger zone that was also reduced from a 14-kilometer radius to just 7 km.

Other communities within the danger zone that are deemed still on lockdown are the villages of Bugaan East, Buso-Buso and Gulod in Laurel town; Buco, as well as Sitios Tabla and San Isidro, Poblacion 6 in Talisay; Calawit in Balete; and Alas-as and Pulang Bato in San Nicolas town.

Reyes said they were considering granting visiting hours for residents in those villages.

Close to a million people were evacuated in the days following Taal’s eruption on

Jan. 12. As people now returned to their communities, long queues of vehicles slowed down traffic on major roads.

“I told them [the residents], the heads of the families [should go] first so they could clean up their homes before the elders and children come home. The ash poses risks of respiratory illnesses,” Reyes said.

Mayors Eulalio Alilio of Lemery and Lester de Sagun of San Nicolas made the same appeal to their constituents.

People returned to ash-covered homes and dead animals, as utility men began fixing power lines and workers of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) were clearing roads.

The DPWH on Monday estimated the damage to national roads in the ravaged areas at P137.16 million.

Roads that require maintenance work include portions of the Palico-Balayan-Batangas Road, Sinisian Bridge, Lemery-Taal Diversion Road, Diokno Highway, Tanauan-Talisay-Tagaytay Road and Talisay-Laurel-Agoncillo Road.

Tagaytay

Elsewhere in the region, small stores have reopened.

In Tagaytay City, classes in 17 schools resumed on Monday, while 21 hotels and 82 restaurants, out of the hundreds shut down by ashfall, resumed operations.

“Everything will return to normal, maybe in weeks or even more. We do it little by little,” said Lito Castro, Batangas disaster response chief.

But what the eruption had probably changed for good was the lives of about 6,000 people, after President Duterte reiterated that Volcano Island was now a permanent danger zone, therefore prohibiting human settlement.

How will the families manage to stay on the island, even secure property titles? “I don’t know. Ask those questions later but right now [with an alert level still up], that’s irrelevant,” Castro said.

In a statement on Monday, Interior Secretary Eduardo Año said, “The PNP is directed to ensure that no one returns to Volcano Island now and in the future, as this has been declared no man’s land by the President himself.”

Senate President Vicente Sotto III called on officials to draw up long-term plans for the rehabilitation of areas affected by the eruption. —WITH REPORTS FROM JEANNETTE I. ANDRADE, TINA G. SANTOS AND LEILA B. SALAVERRIA INQ