Defense chief still calling shot in gov’t relief ops — NDRRMC exec

From the Daily Tribune (Nov 23): Defense chief still calling shot in gov’t relief ops — NDRRMC exec

NDRRMC executive director Undersecretary Eduardo del Rosario, however, stressed that Gazmin remained as the overall “overseer” of the government disaster relief operations.

“The chairperson of the council is focusing on the overall. Secretary Roxas was assigned to Region 8, while in Region 6 it’s Congressman Duenas. So we made that setup to have political leadership on the ground to monitor,” Del Rosario explained.

“But the one who is monitoring all, issuing guidance and orchestrating is the national council headed by the chairperson, no other than Secretary Gazmin,” he added.

A clear indication of the seeming “confused” government efforts was the transfer on Thursday of hundreds of typhoon survivors from the Villamor Air Base in Pasay City to Camp Aguinaldo in Quezon City and back again to VAB.

Del Rosario admitted there was “miscoordination” in the evacuation of the typhoon victims from VAB to the headquarters of the Joint Task Force-National Capital Region (JTF-NCR) in Camp Aguinaldo.

“There was a minor miscoordination… in preparation for the possible increase of inmternally displaced persons from Region 8, we saw the operations at Villamor to be small, so we looked for an alternative place or a place to complement VAB operations,” Del Rosario said.

“When it was done yesterday (Thursday) and when the chairperson of the national council (Gazmin) knew about it, he gave instructions to continue operations at VAB while looking for more suitable place because Camp Aguinaldo is too far…it we must have another site, it must be near the airport,” he added.

There were reports on Thursday blaming some Air Force ladies or wives of PAF officials for the transfer of the typhoon survivors from VAB. Col. Miguel Ernesto Okol, spokesman of the Air Force, denied such information. He said there was an instruction from higher authorities.

Del Rosario said that everything is now settled as the typhoon victims were transported back to VAB.

“Everything is now settled and running smoothly. The processing of IDPs is now back to Villamor Air Base,” he said.
http://www.tribune.net.ph/nation/defense-chief-still-calling-shot-in-gov-t-relief-ops-ndrrmc-exec