Salamat san sa gabos, Secretary Robredo

I first heard of Secretary Jesse Robredo in college. He was one of the people our orientors said was a Lasallian we could be proud of. I never really was aware of his achievements, though, until they came to light this week. 

courtesy of TheLaSallian (www.facebook.com/thelasallian)

It's funny how people whom you never met can have an impact on your life, and Mr. Robredo certainly had that positive impact on me after I heard his story. A devoted family man, he went straight from an official function to be with his daughter, who had just won a swimming competition. To the very end, he showed his love for his family. Admirable. 

It's a moment of infinite loss. I will always remember where I was when I first heard that his plane crashed: at my girlfriend's house, about to eat out. It was a breaking news flash on ABS-CBN. I thought to myself, "It's going to be alright. It will work out just fine." I was wrong. 

For three days, the nation was focused on the search for Robredo, in the vain hope that he was still alive. After all, stranger things had happened. Maybe the secretary had by some miracle escaped and was in fact on an isolated island. Maybe he was floating on the sea, barely clinging to life. 

All those hopes were dashed with the discovery of his body. And I felt a moment of loss. How could someone so good at what he does be taken away? How could the positive future of this country's politics have died? Questions, questions, questions. With no answers.

The truth is, I can think of hundreds of politicians who should have been on that plane instead of Robredo. It seemed like he was one of those people who was not corrupted by power and money, who still led a simple life with his family and friends. His final act says a lot about that. 

If there's anything to be learned here, I daresay that Mr. Robredo's dedication allows us to hope that there's a better future for Philippine politics. It opened up the fact that not all politicians are dirty crooks. Some of them are just like the rest of us, trying to get by, loving our families, dreaming of a bright future, working as hard as humanly possible. 

Some of them are just like Jesse Robredo. 

Home Along Da Riber

Even the roads in front of SM were flooded.

Last week's monsoon rains in the Philippines were terribly tragic. To date, about 80 people have died, either as a direct result of the flooding that followed (drowning, electrocution from walking in areas with exposed electrical wires) or as an indirect result (diseases like leptospirosis). 

And that wasn't even a storm. 

Can you imagine what a storm like 2007's Milenyo would have done? I'll tell you what would have happened: thousands of shanties would have been obliterated, swept away by raging waters. Hundreds if not thousands of people would be dead right now. 

What happened here? There was a time when Metro Manila rarely got flooded. I remember such a time, and that was certainly a cleaner time. Now, however, it seems that we Filipinos have been trapped by our greed. 

Two weeks ago, I watched a very interesting take on this from journalist Ted Failon. There isn't a single entity to be blamed for the recent flooding, or for all the floods in the recent past for that matter. Rather, it seems that it's a confluence of actions that is causing billions in damage. 

Real estate developers are certainly one of the groups that should be blamed here. Many buildings are built on what used to be esteros, which were great drainage systems. So I guess the price of expansion includes the lives of thousands of Filipinos. Many of these developers aren't interested in filling a need. They're interested in lining their pockets. 

Squatters are another group that should be blamed. Many of these people live near or at drainage systems. Their waste and trash contributes a lot to clogging. Why can't the national government do something about them? They should be relocated to another place. And they should be taught that living on land that isn't theirs (and insisting on their so-called "rights" to that land) is really land theft, even though some namby-pamby politicians try to say otherwise. 

Factories are also at fault. The tons of waste that are dumped into rivers are a surefire way of making those same rivers overflow. That waste should be disposed of in a responsible way, and dumping them into rivers and other bodies of water is grossly irresponsible and should be treated as a major crime. Perhaps if some big shot factory owner goes to jail for something like that, these factories would stop doing that cold turkey. 

As much as I hate to say it, though, I'm afraid WE ALL are at fault. Yes, we the citizenry. WE fail to keep our eyes on the state of the environment. WE sometimes (or many times) throw our trash anywhere we please. WE allow real estate developers, squatters, and factories to do whatever they want to do. In other words, WE are our biggest problem. 

Enough is enough.