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‘This is what God gave us. We can only accept it,’ one survivor of the Glan earthquake told Rappler
SARANGANI, Philippines – At the age of 75, Seferino Ugdamin has to figure out the cost of repairing his house in Barangay Tango in Glan, Sarangani, after the 7.8 magnitude earthquake destroyed its foundations last June 8.
More than a week has passed since the disaster. Ugdamin, a farmer by profession, could only count the coins in his pockets, knowing that it would not be enough to pay for even one cord of wood worth P15.
The labor cost for the day alone is estimated at P700. The senior citizen does not even know who to ask for loans from, as almost everyone in his neighborhood also suffered from the same situation: fallen walls, broken glass, and pieces of the house that once was.
“We had a great citizen (help) but it took a long time to arrive. Every three months we wait and now it is almost five months,” Ugdamin said.
(Supposedly, we would receive the help of the elders, but it takes too long to arrive. It takes almost three months to wait, and now, it has been five months already.)
The Department of Social Welfare and Development, through its Social Pension Program for the Indigent Elderly, provides the indigent elderly with P1,000 of social pension per month.
Ugdamin’s house is just one of the 13,314 destroyed houses identified by the Glan municipal government, according to their incident report on Wednesday, June 17. The Sarangani provincial government, in its June 18 report, counted 33,026 destroyed houses in the province.
Visit the city again
Glan is known as the “summer capital” of Sarangani and the oldest municipality in the province. Its rich history and geographical location near Sarangani Bay make it a top tourist attraction and a great place for fishermen.
However, the earthquake left a big gap for its tourists and coastal communities as some roads and bridges were damaged and rendered unusable.
“Tourism has been severely affected because all the beaches are closed,” Glan Victor Mayor James Yap Sr. he told Rappler.
In Barangay Pangyan, south of Glan town center, many families living near the beach were evacuated, as the earthquake destroyed their houses. More than 700 houses in the barangay were destroyed by the earthquake, according to the municipal government. The earthquake and aftershocks did not spare the local mosque.
“I’m afraid of coconuts. It will fall in our backyard. After the earthquake, I just crawled and my son hugged me because he was scared,” Pangyan resident Noriam Abubacar told Rappler.
(I was afraid of coconuts. They were falling in our yard. When the earthquake happened, I crawled, and my son held me because he was afraid.)
Abubacar explained that a relative was hit on the head by a coconut that fell during the earthquake and has not returned home from the hospital as written.
Abubacar’s family is currently staying at Pangyan Primary School, but he returns to his home regularly to check what is left and see if anything can still be saved.
When asked if it hurts him to see his home, Abubacar said it doesn’t matter anymore.
“That is what the Lord gave us. Let’s just accept it,” he said.
(This is what God has given us. We can only accept it.)
– Rappler.com
