Thousands face bleak Christmas in Negros Occidental’s evacuation centers

NEGROS OCCIDENTAL, Philippines – Thousands of families are facing the prospect of spending Christmas in Negros Occidental’s evacuation centers, with the active Kanlaon Volcano threatening to further unleash its fury.

Families, who live within a six-kilometer radius danger zone, may need to stay in various evacuation centers even after Christmas Day, the Task Force Kanlaon (TFK) said.

That’s bad news for thousands of evacuees. In La Castellana town alone, more than 9,000 people were displaced by the eruption of Kanlaon on Monday, December 9.

Raul Fernandez, TFK head, said they have no choice but to follow the advice of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) about keeping people out of harm’s way.

Phivolcs has raised the alert level 3, which means it is not ruling out the likelihood of another eruption anytime soon.

Fernandez told Rappler on Thursday, December 12, that they were expecting the number of evacuees to reach 54,000 or even more in the coming days.

Fernandez said situation could even worsen and this would prompt them to expand the danger zone’s radius from six to 10 kilometers. That would adversely affect 93,000 to 100,000 residents.

Data from La Castellana’s Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office showed that as of 8 pm on Wednesday, December 11, La Castellana’s evacuees swelled to some 9,660 or about 2,897 families from eight villages.

These included 737 individuals from the villages of Biak na Bato, 2,202 from Cabanag-an, 1,500 from Camandag, 2,310 from Mansalanao, 505 from Masulog, 2,577 from Sag-ang, 5 from Robles, and 4 from Manghanoy.

Negros Occidental’s Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (PDRMMO) counted 1,258 evacuees in La Carlota City and 721 in Pontevedra.

The provincial government is preparing the Panaad Park and Stadium in Barangay Mansilingan, Bacolod City, as an evacuation site for 5,000 people.

Officials in other cities and towns in Negros Occidental, which are relatively far from the Kanlaon Volcano, said they were making similar preparations.

There are evacuees, like those in Bago City, who returned to their homes already because their communities are outside the six-kilometer radius danger zone, said Bago Mayor Nicholas Yulo.

While the Department of Health (DOH) and Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) were working with the local governments to help the evacuees, the Office of the Civil Defense (OCD) said more needed to be done because supplies were insufficient in the ongoing relief operations in the evacuation centers. La Castellana alone has 10 evacuation centers. 

The OCD said relief workers need to initially provide more food supplies, chlorinators, aqua tablets, wash kits, hygiene kits, first aid kits, portable toilets, bathing facilities, modular tents, kitchen sets, sleeping kits, rolls of tarps, folding beds, beddings, and face masks.

La Castellana Mayor Alme Rhummyla Nicor-Mangilimutan appealed for more rice donations.

She said food packs from the DSWD were programmed for the breakfast of the evacuees in her town. She said their rice supply for lunch and supper was insufficient for the over 9,000 evacuees.

She said the local government has used up nearly all of its disaster funds, and much of it was spent during a 71-day period following the Kanlaon eruption on June 3.

“We are using our savings,” she said, noting that the donations that were coming paled in comparison to what was sent for the evacuees during the period after the June eruption.

Negros Occidental Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson earlier said the capitol would place the entire province under a state of calamity, a move that would allow the provincial government to use its disaster funds to aid the Kanlaon evacuees.

Mangilimutan said the local government has called off its annual Christmas lighting program because of the crisis. – Rappler.com