St. Bernard ‘gives back to Japan’ after earthquake, tsunami disasters

MAASIN CITY, Southern Leyte, Philippines—St. Bernard town, a beneficiary of Japan’s aid when it lost 1,000 of its people in the Guinsaugon landslide in 2006, has decided to return the favor to Japan.

The St. Bernard Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council has launched a fund raising campaign called the “Guinsaugon, St. Bernard Gives Back to Japan.”

After the 2006 Guinsaugon landslide in St. Bernard, the people of Japan provided continued support not only for emergency response but also in the rehabilitation and recovery of St. Bernard, MDRRMC information officer Jane Araneta said in an email.

The members of the MDRRMC headed by St. Bernard Mayor Rico Rentuza met three days after the Japan earthquake to discuss how they could help Japan.

Araneta added that donation boxes with the slogan “Guinsaugon St. Bernard Gives Back to Japan” were distributed to the 30 barangay (villages) of the town and several establishments, including the municipal hall where the people could drop their donations.

She said the fund raising slogan was a takeoff from a Philippine Daily Inquirer front page headline that read “Guinsaugon gives back big time.”

Negros Occidental Gov. Alfredo Marañon Jr. on Sunday said he expected the province to raise about P1 million in aid for the earthquake and tsunami-hit victims of Japan.

He said the donations have been pouring in, and at the fiesta in Sagay City during the weekend, the donations from the public placed in a drop off area reached about P8,000.

The Negros Occidental provincial government would be donating P250,000, while the cities of Bago, Sagay and Silay have committed P100,000 each, apart from numerous other groups already making contributions, Marañon said.

The donations would be sent through the Organization for Industrial, Spiritual and Cultural Advancement (OISCA), Marañon said. OISCA is a non-government organization based in Japan that has several projects, including a livelihood component, in Negros Occidental.

OISCA Japan has offered to house 100 of 500 Filipinos who have fled to Tokyo amid the radiation scare in northern Japan, he added.

OISCA has a training center in Sesuka Ken south of Tokyo, according to the governor, who is president of OISCA Philippines.

But Shegemi Watanabe of OISCA on Sunday said the Philippine Embassy officials in Tokyo decided not to send the 100 Filipinos to the OISCA facility because it was too far, about 300 kilometers, from Tokyo.

The Filipino refugees were housed at a church in Tokyo and OISCA has provided them with the needed blankets, Watanabe said.