Recto on new disaster agency: It's the power, funding that count; not the name

Batangas Rep. Ralph Recto on Monday, Aug. 1, stressed that the “powers and functions” should come first in the consideration of creating a new disaster response agency instead of its official name.

“I think signage is the least important. The substantial aspects, like funding, to cite one, are what matter most,” Recto said in a statement.

Recto, one of the deputy speakers in the 19th Congress, was reacting to suggestions to strengthen the existing disaster agency by creating a new one.

This new agency will be called the Department of Disaster Resilience (DDR), although President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. has yet to officially decide whether or not it will be placed under the Office of the President (OP), as suggested by her sister, Senator Imee Marcos.

READ: Bongbong backpedals, now agrees with sis Imee’s proposal to create disaster resilience body

Recto said changing the name of the disaster agency into a department “does not automatically make it a super, awesome agency".

To drive home his message, he quoted the saying: “It does not matter if the cat is black or white, for as long as it catches the mice.”

For the lawmaker, the creation of this agency should go beyond “karatula (sign board) change, or a rebadging” of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRMMC).

The NDRRMC, chaired by the Secretary of National Defense, is a multi-agency body which handles all disaster-related initiatives.

Recto believes the challenge is how to make the new agency “an upgrade that is far superior” than the NDRRMC and its emergency response system.

READ: House backs Imee’s call to create disaster resilience body

The congressman said this agency “must be fully staffed and fully funded” to be effective in disaster response.

“Of course ang focus pa rin (the focus still) is disaster resilience because an ounce of disaster preparedness is worth a pound of disaster response when damage is mitigated,” noted.

Recto also cited another proposal to fund the creation of a “ready-to-deploy AFP medical brigade” that will work in “peacetime” and during crisis.

“If you are a country battered by two dozen typhoons a year, rocked by earthquakes, dotted by volcanoes, whose cities and farms are regularly flooded, then you need this response infrastructure,” he said.