Local governance

NO HOLDS BARRED
Ike Señeres

Rescue, relief and rehab represent a complete supply chain (CSC) that should now become the three “R’s” of disaster monitoring, management and mitigation. The latter should now also become the three “M’s” of the same CSC. In the first place, how many of our local government officials are aware that it is indeed a CSC?

A Filipina citizen who is working with the a United Nations relief agency just happened to be in the Philippines when the typhoons struck, and so she was asked to assist in the local rescue efforts, and also to assess whatever she sees. In her report, she said that she was SHOCKED to see the state of UNPREPAREDNESS of the local governments in dealing with the disasters, including the national agencies as well.

By now, the government is already into the rehab stage of the CSC, or at least it is theoretically supposed to. While it is supposed to be doing rehab already, it is barely able to do good in the relief stage. Meanwhile, the threat of another typhoon looms, and I wonder whether it is already trying to improve its capabilities in rescue operations.

The mandate of the government in the three “M’s” is to monitor, manage and mitigate. These three components are intertwined with each other, and the chain could not work if one component is missing. As I say this, I wonder if the national government is already planning to upgrade its weather forecasting infra, which is completely analog based as I know it.

Monitoring is the most basic of all the three components because everything should start with it. In this time and age of modern digital technology, it is a shame to still hang on to analog means, especially when the lives and limbs of our citizens are concerned. In this time, we should already be talking about REAL TIME data, because the delay in data could mean the deaths of more people and the destruction of more properties.

As I pondered over the apparent incompetence of many local authorities in dealing with the disasters, I came across the question of whether there is something wrong with our local government system, or whether there is something wrong in the way that we are electing our local authorities. I have already concluded that it is a case of the latter. We are not electing the right people who could deliver the right services to us.

In the coming elections, we should elect candidates from the political parties that have a program of managing all aspects of local governance. The emphasis here should be on the parties, because from now on, we should proceed on the presumption that no single individual is capable of planning and implementing good governance programs, no matter how good or how popular he or she is.

The core of every good management program should always be a good plan that is both doable and sustainable. Needless to say, the planning should be the product of a process that should involve many technical and legal experts, meaning that it should not be the product of one man’s thinking, no matter how intelligent or powerful he or she is.

Speaking about planning, I will never get tired of saying that according to the law, all plans of the national government agencies and the local government units (LGUs) should be in line with, and should be consistent with Agenda 21, the long term agenda for sustainable development here in the Philippines. In other words, we should elect local officials who not only understand Agenda 21, but who could plan and implement in line with it.

At the risk of stating the obvious, I will also not get tired of saying that all planning activities should start with good data gathering, and should end with the operation and maintenance of good databases. In a recent report aired by one of the networks, it was mentioned that the government was supposed to have implemented a Geographic Information System (GIS) a long time ago, but it did not materialize. What happened to that?

A GIS database is not everything, but it should really be at the core of all local planning activities, incorporating all demographic and topographic data that could reasonably be gathered. With GIS at the core, it would then be easy to include a Global Positioning System (GPS) on one hand and a Short Messaging System (SMS) on the other hand, thus making it open to all.

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