Cabbie found dead under bridge

A TAXI driver who went missing last Sunday afternoon was found dead under the Canduman-Cabancalan Bridge in sitio Riverside, barangay Kalunasan in Mandaue City at 9:30 a.m. yesterday.

Edward Clarin, a 27-year-old resident of barangay San Jose in Cebu City was fished out by a team from the Cebu City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.

Senior Supt. Anderson Comar, the Cebu City fire marshal who headed the search, said relatives told them that Clarin was drunk at the banks of the Butuanon River when the soil underneath his feet loosened, causing him to fall into the waters.

Clarin was dragged by the strong current seven to eight kilometers away until he was found lifeless and covered with weeds under the bridge.

His remains were brought to the St. Francis Funeral Homes in Cebu City.

The Cebu City government will extend burial assistance to the victim’s family.

The heavy downpour last Sunday destroyed four houses in Bacayan, Cebu City.

Alvin Santillana, head of the Cebu City Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council, said they asked six other households to vacate their houses at the riverbanks due to the danger of landslide.

The families were relocated in a vacant lot where tents were set up.

In Taptap, a landslide caused rocks and soil to block the road. Heavy equipment were sent to clean the area.

Elsewhere, several residents of sitio Common in barangay Bacayan, Cebu City, were adjusting to life outside of their homes at the riverbank after being relocated to avoid the rise in water level of the Butuanon River.

Eight-year-old Jenny Lipalan teared up when she saw her books swept away by the flood.

She said she was doing her homework when her father told her to get out of the house.

“I was unable to bring my clothes and books because we were in a hurry,” Jenny told Cebu Daily News in an interview.

Her home was one of eight that were swept by floodwaters at 2 p.m. last Sunday.

Jenny said she and her seven other siblings watched as their house, located a meter away from the riverbank, was swept away.

A solitary wooden post was all that remained of their house.

The family now lives on a tent inside the Villa del Rio, where her mother also works as a housemaid.

Her father looks after them in the house. Jenny said they were living on canned goods given by the barangay.

Cebu Daily News saw Jenny sharing a small container of milk with her younger siblings. At night, they all sleep on plywood.

About 10 families occupied the four tents set up in sitio Common.

Sacks of clothes, kitchenwares, electric fans and TV were scattered in the ground along with improvised beds.

Geologist Josephine Aleta of the Environment Management Bureau (EMB) said the river was already silted.

“The waterflow was slanted to the embankment. The weight of the houses also caused the poor soil quality to collapse. The soil quality is very poor and porous,” she said.

She said they would recommend the relocation of more than 30 houses at the riverbank and construction of dikes and ripraps to stabilize the slope.

The bureau said soil dumped from a development project of the Maria Montessori International School (MMIS) is causing the siltation and decreased the width of the 20-meter river.

Located on an elevated area across barangay Common, the school widened their parking lot last April.

Aleta said they will ask the bureau to issue a notice of violation to the MMIS.

The silt also occupied more than half of the river in the area where the landslide occurred.

“They didn’t set up a slope protection to prevent the soil from falling down,” Aleta said. She said the river is now just five meters wide.

Santillana said he will notify Cebu City Hall on the possible violations committed by the school.

“We might also issue a cease-and-desist order on them,” he told CDN.

Cebu Daily News sought MMIS for comment, but the security officials there said their school administrator was out.  Jhunnex Napallacan and Candeze R. Mongaya