COASTLINE DISASTERS
The front page of SunsStar-Cebu on August 10, 2006 depicted pictures of coastline residents trying to salvage their belongings from the destruction of big waves and high winds.
I submitted the following for "Speak Out", however the editors at SunStar-Cebu did not see it fit for publication. (Welcome to the magic of blogging!):
I feel the pain of the people depicted on your front-page pictures today (August 10, 2006)…as I do whenever squatter settlements are ravaged by man-made calamities such as the recent fire in Mambaling.
I submitted the following for "Speak Out", however the editors at SunStar-Cebu did not see it fit for publication. (Welcome to the magic of blogging!):
COASTAL AND RIVERSIDE SQUATTERS
By Alfonso Y. Amores, MD - OceanCare Advocates, Inc.
I feel the pain of the people depicted on your front-page pictures today (August 10, 2006)…as I do whenever squatter settlements are ravaged by man-made calamities such as the recent fire in Mambaling.
In these times of crises, we should recall the Chinese character for “crisis”. It does depict disaster and equally important, opportunity.
We, the community in general should take this opportunity to point out that the illegal coastal and riverside settlements are causing untold and unquantified damage to the ecology of Mactan and surrounding islands. There are more than 13 rivers and creeks emptying directly into the Mactan Channel, each and everyone of them teeming with thousands of squatters on the river banks. These and the coastal colonies do not segregate their garbage into “malata” and “dili malata”, compost the “malata’s” and deposit the “dili malata’s” in the bins provided along the streets. No, along with the biological and kitchen wastes, these are dumped directly into the water underneath. Tons everyday!
When the rains come, these and all of the water wastes of Cebu City (remember, there is no water treatment facility in the city) are flushed into the estuaries. Then the tidewaters pick it up and deposit the garbage mass into Mactan Channel. A significant portion of these is then carried by the ebb tide towards the north end of Mactan Island, and then flushed down the Gilutongan Channel.
The health implications are: a) heavy metal poisoning (arsenic, cyanide, lead, etc.), and b) biological pollution (we now have positive coliform counts along the Gilutongan Channel coastlines, our so-called tourism coasts).
The ecological implication is death of the coral animal and destruction of the reefs from algal blooms and crown-of-thorns infestation that flourish in the midst of human-wastes pollution.
The financial implication is loss of Mactan/Olango’s dive industry - hundreds of millions of pesos per anum - due to destruction of the reefs (dive attractions) and the intolerable occurrences of piles of garbage drifting by when one comes out of a scuba dive.
So, what to do? Whatever it is that our benevolent hearts wish to do, don’t let anyone put up houses on the coasts and riverbanks. Section 51 of the Water Code of the Philippines says: “…no structures can be built 3 meters from the highest tide mark or from the riverbanks…” The law is the law is the law. Bisan dapat malo-oy ta, kun labag sa bala-od, labag sa bala-od. When we make exceptions, everyone else will ask for it, and pretty soon we will end up in virtual anarchy (which we are now close to).
We, the community in general should take this opportunity to point out that the illegal coastal and riverside settlements are causing untold and unquantified damage to the ecology of Mactan and surrounding islands. There are more than 13 rivers and creeks emptying directly into the Mactan Channel, each and everyone of them teeming with thousands of squatters on the river banks. These and the coastal colonies do not segregate their garbage into “malata” and “dili malata”, compost the “malata’s” and deposit the “dili malata’s” in the bins provided along the streets. No, along with the biological and kitchen wastes, these are dumped directly into the water underneath. Tons everyday!
When the rains come, these and all of the water wastes of Cebu City (remember, there is no water treatment facility in the city) are flushed into the estuaries. Then the tidewaters pick it up and deposit the garbage mass into Mactan Channel. A significant portion of these is then carried by the ebb tide towards the north end of Mactan Island, and then flushed down the Gilutongan Channel.
The health implications are: a) heavy metal poisoning (arsenic, cyanide, lead, etc.), and b) biological pollution (we now have positive coliform counts along the Gilutongan Channel coastlines, our so-called tourism coasts).
The ecological implication is death of the coral animal and destruction of the reefs from algal blooms and crown-of-thorns infestation that flourish in the midst of human-wastes pollution.
The financial implication is loss of Mactan/Olango’s dive industry - hundreds of millions of pesos per anum - due to destruction of the reefs (dive attractions) and the intolerable occurrences of piles of garbage drifting by when one comes out of a scuba dive.
So, what to do? Whatever it is that our benevolent hearts wish to do, don’t let anyone put up houses on the coasts and riverbanks. Section 51 of the Water Code of the Philippines says: “…no structures can be built 3 meters from the highest tide mark or from the riverbanks…” The law is the law is the law. Bisan dapat malo-oy ta, kun labag sa bala-od, labag sa bala-od. When we make exceptions, everyone else will ask for it, and pretty soon we will end up in virtual anarchy (which we are now close to).
posted by mactanman at 6:34 PM
1 Comments:
Greetings,
Great blog! I wanted to share with you another blog that you and your readers might also find of interest. The Texas Coastal Law blog from the University of Texas School of Law: http://texascoastallaw.blogspot.com/
If you are interested in any aspect of coastal law, this site links to not only sites about Texas Coastal Law, but also sites about American Coastal Law. Cheers!
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