BORONGAN CITY– The Department of Public Works and Highways – Eastern Samar District Engineering Office (DPWH-ESDEO) with the Department of Education is set to implement 16 school building projects all over Eastern Samar this year.

In an interview during the PIA Eastern Samar’s Huruhimangraw ha Este radio program, Jayson Espeso, DPWH-ESDEO information officer, said the projects involve the construction of several one-storey two-classroom school building in the province.

The total budget for the projects amounts to P79.8 million under the DepEd Basic Educational Facilities Fund (BEFF) for Fiscal Year 2024.

The schools benefiting from this budget allocation include Bulawan Elementary School in Maslog; Guiuan East Central Elementary School, Tubabao National High School, and National High School in Guiuan; Naparaan Elementary School and Tagbacan Elementary School in Salcedo; San Isidro Elementary School and Hilabaan National High School in Dolores; San Jose Elementary School in Mercedes; Tinago Elementary School in Quinapondan; Can-avid National High School in Can-avid; Eastern Samar Comprehensive National High School in Borongan City; Malinao Elementary School in Taft; Giporlos Central School in Giporlos; Llorente National High School- Barobo Extension in Llorente; and Maydolong Central Elementary School in Maydolong.

District Engineer Domcelio Natividad announced that the Notices of Award for the school building projects were already issued within May 2024.

Natividad added that the timing allows for the optimal implementation of the construction projects while the students are on vacation, minimizing disruption to their classes.
The district engineer also emphasized the importance of this period for contractors to expedite construction efforts.

“We urge contractors to take full advantage of the vacation period to ensure timely completion of these projects,” said Natividad.

In 2023, DPWH-ESDEO has also implemented 21 school building projects with a total appropriation of P152.898 million under DepEd BEFF FY 2023 funding.

The district engineer mentioned that out of the 21 projects, 20 school buildings have already been completed and turned over to the schools while the remaining project, located in San Isidro Primary School in Lawaan Eastern Samar, is nearly complete with an accomplishment of 95.07 percent.

Natividad assured that the district office is fully committed to fast-tracking the implementation of these projects.

“We are dedicated to ensuring that these school buildings are constructed efficiently and in accordance with DPWH standards specifications. Also, this initiative underscores the commitment of the DPWH to improve educational infrastructure, providing a better learning environment for students in the province,” the district engineer said.
(VEE TOLENTINO GUMBAN, PIA EASTERN SAMAR)

ORMOC CITY-A fire watcher for a local company was apprehended with seven sachets containing a white crystalline substance suspected to be shabu during a buy-bust operation.

The operation was conducted by the Station Drug Enforcement Team of Police Station 2 of the Ormoc City Police Office at about 10:50 pm on Friday (June 14) in Purok 2, Brgy. Cagbuhangin, this city.

The suspect, identified as Roselle Macaban, also known as “Amaw,” is 26 years old, single, and employed as a fire watcher at Tacophil Construction.

Macaban is listed as a street level individual on the local police’s drug watch list.

During the operation, authorities recovered one cut plastic straw containing a white crystalline substance suspected to be shabu, weighing approximately 0.54 grams, purchased by an operative for P500.

A body search, conducted in the presence of an elected official and a local media representative, yielded five sachets and one heat-sealed transparent cut plastic straw of suspected shabu.

The total estimated weight of the recovered substances was 2.20 grams, with an estimated street value of P15,000.

No statement was issued by the arrested suspect to the media covering the operation.
Charges for violations of Sections 5 (selling illegal drugs) and 11 (possession of illegal drugs) of Article II of RA 9165, the Comprehensive Law Against Illegal Drugs of 2002, have been filed against the suspect at the City Prosecutor’s Office.

Macaban is temporarily detained at the lock-up cell of Police Station 2 of OCPO in Brgy. Cagbuhangin. (ROBERT DEJON)

TACLOBAN CITY-Filipino climate campaigners joined a worldwide call for climate finance that will enable developing countries, such as the Philippines, to address climate change to coincide with the 50th Group of 7 (G7) Summit on June 13, 2024.

“The unprecedented heat in most of Southeast and South Asia, and the floods in southern Brazil, remind us that developing countries are hit the hardest despite contributing the least to the climate crisis,” said Lidy Nacpil, coordinator of Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development (APMDD).

On June 11, APMDD and allied climate activist groups marched to the U.S. Embassy in Manila to tell G7 leaders that “rich, industrialized countries of the Global North are most responsible for causing this crisis with their historical and current greenhouse gas emissions.”

“Therefore, they are obligated to pay the costs of mitigation, adaptation, loss and damage, and ensuring a just transition in the Global South. If they do not deliver the amount we need, we cannot limit average global temperatures to below 1.5C,” Nacpil said in a statement to the media.

“The climate crisis is escalating, and people in the Global South are suffering from its increasingly devastating impacts,” Nacpil added.

Citing the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), APMDD and fellow climate campaigners said that developed countries agreed to provide climate finance to cover the costs of developing countries’ climate programs and projects.

The target amount of climate finance that must be raised for the Global South, will be a big agenda item at the climate negotiations at COP29 in December, according to the climate activists.

They added that COP29 “is expected to set the new collective quantified goal for climate finance, which will replace the previous goal of $100 billion a year pledged by Global North governments.”

“This $100 billion pledge, made in 2009 and reiterated in 2015, has already been exposed and criticized as severely inadequate, yet the world’s richest nations have continuously failed to meet it. The G7 has collectively delivered only $30.9 billion through the UNFCCC’s climate funds,” APMDD said.

To raise funds for climate finance, the groups suggested that G7 leaders can tax elites and corporations, who, according to them, “are the world’s top polluters and profiteers.”

In its 2021 first Needs Determination Report, UNFCCC estimated that the cost of mitigation and adaptation would be $5.9 to $11.4 trillion until 2030.

“However, this amount represents the cost of only 26% of the needs of 24 countries, out of the 164 developing country parties to the UNFCCC, meaning the real cost of mitigation and adaptation is much higher. This figure also excludes economic loss and damage, which is estimated to cost at least $400 billion per year by 2030,” APMDD said.

(RONALD O.REYES)