Media aid drive under way
for victims of Sendong

MEDIA GROUPS all over the country have launched a relief drive for the benefit of media colleagues and their families who lost everything after typhoon Sendong thundered across Northern Mindanao last December 16.

According to the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP), at least 36 journalists and their families have lost their homes to the flash floods that swept through Cagayan de Oro City and Iligan City.

relief packages at the NUJP office in Quezon City

Despite the loss of everything they owned, many of these mediamen still insisted on covering the aftermath of the tragedy, if only to make sure that word of the plight of the victims gets out through the mainstream media, said NUJP Secretary General Rowena Paraan. Some of these mediamen work all day to gather the news, and then go back to their families at night for another kind of work – that of trying to put their lives back together again.

Paraan said journalists from other far-flung areas have volunteered money and relief packages to help their colleagues in Northern Mindanao. The NUJP has already sent 14 boxes of relief goods to the area, with another 8 boxes set to be shipped out for free through ZestAir.

At the same time, Paraan said they are considering the launch of a full fundraising campaign in order to raise money to help these journalists back on their feet and rebuild their devastated lives.

Typhoon Sendong killed at least a thousand people, with another thousand still missing, making it the deadliest typhoon to hit the country this year. The typhoon submerged much of Iligan City and Cagayan de Oro, areas seldom hit by tropical storms. Some say the high death toll was due to the unexpected rise of floodwaters during the dead of night. The flooding has partly been blamed on upland logging and commercial farming practices that prevent the soil from absorbing more rainwater.

Cagayan de Oro-based MindaNews photo editor Froilan Gallardo snapped several photographs of the aftermath of typhoon Sendong, and the efforts of residents to get back on their feet.