The proposed transfer of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) to the Office of the President (OP) makes sense for House Speaker Martin Romualdez, saying it would "simplify the flow of responsibilities" among concerned agencies.
Romualdez gave this reaction Tuesday, Nov. 8 to President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.'s desire to move the NDRRMC, which is currently under the Department of National Defense-Office of Civil Defense (OCD).
The Speaker said such realignment would give Marcos direct hand in managing government responses to natural calamities and in mitigating the impact of climate change-related issues and problems.
“It simplifies the flow of responsibility and directives to the more than 30 departments, agencies and organizations sitting in the council,” Romualdez said.
He says the President’s preferred transfer of the NDRRMC is made more meaningful by the fact that it was announced on the day super typhoon "Yolanda" (international name Haiyan) made landfall in Eastern Visayas nine years ago.
Yolanda (international name: Haiyan) is considered a category 5 typhoon. The scale of destruction that it brought to the Philippines, particularly in Leyte and Samar, was the stuff of nightmares.
Romualdez, Leyte’s 1st district representative, noted that climate change-related problems like extreme weather conditions are worsening.
“Like many nations, we have no choice but to prepare for these eventualities. Our situation is even peculiar, because we are visited by an average of 20 tropical storms every year. We have to streamline our disaster responses and the management of risks to natural calamities,” Romualdez said.
He noted that the country “has to become climate change resilient".