‘Yolanda’ survivors rally against climate crisis

We almost lost our lives from these catastrophes…we had trauma from this. Knowing how much the youth can do something to make a change, to call for climate justice, we won’t waste this time to take action

TACLOBAN CITY — Thousands of youth survivors of typhoon “Yolanda” that struck this region more than five years ago gathered in two separate venues in Eastern Visayas to call for stronger government action against climate change.

At least 26 other locations in the Philippines will be the center of rallies, workshops and related activities where youth converge to show solidarity of Global Climate Strikes inspired by teen climate activist Greta Thunberg.

“We call on the Philippine government to declare a climate emergency,” says Ronan Renz Napoto, a convenor of Youth Strike for Climate Philippines in Tacloban City. His sister, Maria Anita, is helping organize a similar activity in the town of Guiuan in Eastern Samar, where typhoon “Yolanda” first made a landfall in 8 November 2013.

Napoto, who hails from Guiuan town, said that growing up in a coastal town, he thought typhoons were just normal occurrences until “Yolanda” came that killed some of his friends and relatives and threatened the lives of his closest family members.

“We almost lost our lives from these catastrophes…we had trauma from this. Knowing how much the youth can do something to make a change, to call for climate justice, we won’t waste this time to take action,” Napoto said.

“Our silence and inaction towards this climate crisis means risking our future. This is a crisis and we have to acknowledge it, do something about it. We need clear and concrete policies from our government leaders that will act on the urgency of this,” he added.

The group also demanded the city government of Tacloban “to strengthen our Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation-Disaster Risk Reduction and Management (CCA-MDRRM) policies and enact legislation on CCAM-DRRM research and development.”

Napoto said the Philippines is the third most disaster-prone county since it is at the Tropical Cyclone Belt and the Pacific Ring of fire, hence the need for continued research on CCAM-DRRM to support the implementation of existing laws to ensure that it is effective and efficient and for the reference of future laws.