People Surge: President Aquino must go if he cannot help Yolanda survivors

Press Release
February 19, 2014

TACLOBAN CITY – Reacting to the rejection today by President Benigno Simeon Aquino III of a petition signed by more than 17,000 typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) survivors from Eastern Visayas demanding emergency cash assistance and other government aid, the People Surge alliance said the P40,000 being sought for each family was legitimate and the President was in the wrong.

“Eastern Visayas depends on agriculture, which was heavily damaged by Yolanda, and the P40,000 emergency cash assistance for each family is mainly intended to tide over the majority who are peasants until they could recover their crops,” said Dr. Efleda Bautista, a storm survivor and Executive Vice Chairperson of People Surge. “We want to emphasize that this is a big issue for the peasants who were left penniless by Yolanda , to make it clearer to an haciendero president to grasp a matter of life and death for millions in Eastern Visayas.”

“If the President cannot address the crisis caused by Yolanda as well as other issues of real concern to the people, his capability to govern is already under question. The petition signed by 17,000 Yolanda survivors was a polite reminder to the government of its shortcomings, but President Aquino virtually tore it up and laughed in the faces of the typhoon survivors. We do not deserve this, and we think the rest of the Filipino people agree with us.”

Bautista said the neglected Yolanda survivors are only one of many among the rest of the Filipino people who are bringing forward their grievances – the pork barrel scam, the soaring prices of basic commodities, water & electricity, the abandonment of social services, among others – that all spell out President Aquino's incapability to govern.

The vice chairperson of People Surge also slammed the President for belittling the immediate demands of the petitioners from Eastern Visayas, and for flippantly suggesting to those criticizing government's inaction that they can find a livelihood if they have time to protest.

“For the information of Noynoy Aquino, the demands for P40,000 cash assistance, livelihood, housing, and social services are what the government should have given right after Yolanda. The typhoon destroyed people's lives, houses and livelihood, destroyed the two most important cash crops in the region, abaca and coconut, as well as other staple crops. Yet such basic government responsibilities based on the people's real needs never materialized up to now. The people have absolutely nothing and all the President is giving them is hot air. If the life of the poor is too difficult for him to imagine that he won't lift a finger, we suggest he try living in a tent or a bunkhouse, and eating porridge every day for the rest of the year like many Yolanda survivors still do.”