PR
The House of Representatives approved today at the committee level the
substitute bill creating the Department of Disaster Resilience (DDR).
The House Committee on Ways and Means approved the substitute bill
creating the DDR after the measure got the nod of the House Committee
on Government Reorganization last week.
Tingog party-list Rep. Yedda Marie Romualdez, chairperson of the House Committee on Welfare of Children, is the principal author of the DDR, along with her husband, House Majority Leader and Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez.
Marked as an urgent bill by President Rodrigo Duterte himself, Yedda
Romualdez said it was the second time the House of Representatives has
passed the DDR proposal after it was overran by the 2018 national
elections in the 17th Congress.
Public clamor for the measure ensued following a series of earthquake
devastations in Mindanao, she said.
According to her, the Department of Disaster Resilience is envisioned
to be the primary government agency that is “responsible, accountable,
and liable for leading, managing, and organizing national efforts to
prevent and reduce disaster risks; prepare for and respond to
disasters; and recover, rehabilitate, and build forward better after
the destruction.”
Yedda Romualdez said the DDR will be a full-blown department headed by
a Secretary, supported by undersecretaries, assistant secretaries and
directors with an initial budget of P10 billion.
The proposal initially required taking under DDR’s wings, from their
mother departments, the PHIVOLCS and the PAGASA, the Geo-Hazard
Assessment and Engineering Geology Section of the MGB, and the BFP,
said Albay Rep. Joey Sarte Salceda, who chairs the House Committee on
Ways and Means.
But the House-approved version has settled for a new provision that
preferred the “joint supervision” of these vital government bureaus,
which the DDR needed for unity of command during disasters.
Section 94 of the proposal, on Inter-Departmental Relations, now
provides that the “DDR shall exercise joint supervision with: 1) the
Department of Science and Technology (DOST) over PAGASA and PHIVOLCS;
2) The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), over
Geo-Hazard Assessment and Engineering Geology Section of the Mines and
Geosciences Bureau (MGB), and; 3) the Department of Interior and Local
Government (DILG) over the BFP.
The provision also requires “that the DDR and these departments shall
establish systems and protocols for sustained sharing of knowledge,
data, information technology, facilities and other resources critical
to DRR at all times; that the DDR shall provide DRR training,
upgrading of equipment and other logistical requirement… that the said
agencies will be under the full supervision and direct control of the
DDR in anticipation of, during, and as necessary in the determination
of the Secretary, in aftermath of emergencies and disasters”.
But DDR will still have the Office of Civil Defense (OCD) as its core
organization to which will be integrated the Climate Change Commission
Office, the Health Emergency Management Bureau of the Department of
Health (DOH), the Disaster Response Assistance and the Disaster
Response Management Bureau of Department of Social Welfare and
Development.
The DDR will also retain the OCD National Council with an expanded
membership as the policy advisory board of the Department.
