Mas practical ito: Ping pushes dedicated OP office instead of new department to ensure disaster resilience

Instead of creating a new full-size department to ensure disaster resilience, why not set up a dedicated office under the Office of the President with the authority to mobilize concerned government agencies?

Sen. Panfilo Lacson said Monday such a dedicated office could get the job done with fewer personnel – and without the limitations on the current National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.

“A dedicated office under the Office of the President with a Cabinet rank and full authority to mobilize the concerned government agencies before, during and after calamities both natural and man-made – from policy-making and planning all the way to implementation – would do the job with much less funding and minimum number of staff and personnel,” Lacson, who chairs the Senate’s national defense committee, said in a statement.

In contrast, Lacson noted a council-type organization like the NDRRMC has a “very limited capability mainly because it is merely coordinative.”

Lacson earlier raised questions surrounding the creation of a new Department of Disaster Resilience, including whether it would be feasible and if there would be proper funding for it.

He said the Department of Budget and Management says at least P1.5 billion is needed to set up the department, not yet including added salaries and capital outlay.

Also, Lacson said that during the first public hearing that discussed the matter last January, the stakeholders who served as resource persons also cited at least three concerns about creating a new department for disaster and risk reduction:

* a policy direction for right-sizing the bureaucracy that is already bloated.
* the implementation especially of recovery and rehabilitation will be carried out not by the proposed new department but by existing agencies such as the Department of Public Works and Highways, Department of Social Welfare and Development, and Department of Health.
* other newly created departments like the Department of Information and Communications Technology and the Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development “cannot be properly funded, or at least are not given the appropriate funding to work properly.”

Source: Latest Politics News Today (Politics.com.ph)