Manila: Philippines President Benigno Aquino vowed to punish those allegedly responsible for actions that contributed to the December 19 flooding that took more than 1,000 lives in the cities of Iligan and Cagayan de Oro in Northern Mindanao.
"There's supposed to be a logging ban, and that wasn't implemented," Aquino said in an interview aired by ABS-CBN News.
Aquino, in early February, had issued an executive order banning the harvest of timber across the country as a measure to address the rapid depletion of the country's remaining forest reserves. Apparently this directive had been ignored. This, coupled with some heavy rainfall at 50mm in a few hours caused the flood tragedy of catastrophic proportions.
According to earlier reports, some local politicians and officials in Lanao were responsible for the proliferation of illegal logging. Cagayan de Oro and Iligan City are both located downstream from Lanao.
On the night of the tragedy, logs harvested illegally from the hinterland of Lanao piled up downstream, thus causing a logjam that served as a virtual dam, which later broke and discharged huge amounts of water downstream, catching residents of riverside communities unawares. Officials and individuals in cahoots with these illegal loggers will be made to pay, Aquino said.
