Disaster response mechanism still in place – Palace spokesman

Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang assured the public on Tuesday that the government’s disaster response structure remained “in place” to deal with victims of Supertyphoon Yolanda  amid concerns that rehabilitation was slow in certain areas and hundreds of bodies were still unburied nearly two months after the calamity.

The “structure is in place,” said Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma, referring to the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.

Coloma replied that local government units were “accountable to the national organization” when he was asked about the delivery of aid and rehabilitation efforts in areas ravaged by the typhoon early in November.

“Mayors and local officials are still subject to DILG (Department of the Interior and Local Government) discipline,” he said in a text message to reporters.

One concern was the alleged delay in the identification and burial of more than a thousand bodies left rotting in one village on the outskirts Tacloban City.

Coloma said the National Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Health were “primarily responsible for identifying and burying bodies in coordination with LGUs.”

Coloma had earlier promised to look into the matter when told about it during his weekly media briefing aired over Radyo ng Bayan last Sunday.

“Perhaps we need to verify the situation that we’re seeing and know the bigger explanation because there are agencies responsible for these matters,” he said.

“We will find out what the concerned agencies have to say,” he added. “What I can say is there is already a program for these things and based on the reports that we got, authorities were not neglecting [the bodies].”

The man in charge of the government’s overall rehabilitation effort is former Sen. Panfilo Lacson, who was assigned a Cabinet rank in early December.

Under Memorandum Order No. 62, President Aquino instructed all government offices and its “instrumentalities” to “render full assistance and cooperation to the presidential assistant (Lacson) as may be required to carry out his functions.”

Lacson will act as “overall manager and coordinator of rehabilitation, recovery, and reconstruction efforts of government departments, agencies and instrumentalities in the affected areas, to the extent allowed by law.”

“Secretary Lacson’s main task is reconstruction,” Coloma said, noting that the Department of Social Welfare and Development “ensures that those still in evacuation centers will get food packs.”

The Department of Public Works and Highways was in charge of constructing bunk houses as temporary shelter for typhoon victims.

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