‘Yolanda’ museum eyed in Tacloban

TACLOBAN CITY — The National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) is pushing for the establishment of a “Yolanda” memorial center to preserve the memories of the super typhoon that pummeled Eastern Visayas in 2013.

Officials from four national government agencies and the Tacloban city government will form a technical working group to come up with a proposal for the center.

Initially, the museum will need 150 million, but agencies will come up with more accurate estimates after the proposal’s completion within two months. It will rise within the city, considered as super-typhoon Yolanda’s ground zero.

“It will be a site where people can go to learn about our experiences and how we recovered from the disaster,” NEDA regional director Bonifacio Uy said yesterday.

The proposed project will be patterned after a museum in Sendai, Japan, which features photographs and other items showing the tsunami damage to the city and the progress of rebuilding.

NEDA, the agency tasked to monitor post-Yolanda recovery efforts, will lead in the drafting of the proposal. Other members of the technical working group are the Department of Public Works and Highways, Department of Tourism, Office of the Civil Defense, and Tacloban City government.

Uy is lobbying for funding of the proposed museum under the remaining funds of the 2016 Yolanda Rehabilitation and Recovery Program (YRRP). The proposal will be submitted to the National Disaster and Risk Reduction Management Council.

“As an alternative source of funds, we can also include the proposal in the 2018 budget of the Department of Tourism,” Uy added.

YRRP is the government’s blueprint to help Yolanda-hit communities recover from the country’s deadliest typhoon on record, which killed at least 6,300 people on Nov. 8, 2013. It is the strongest storm recorded at landfall.