Friday 25 April 2014

Parang beach clean-up intensifies




Every day scenes at the beach during clean-up activities. - MWBuzzpics by AP HERNANDEZ

 
By ALFREDO P HERNANDEZ

THE clean-up of the Parang beach has been intensified.
On Saturday, March 29, the Mambulao local government launched a sustained effort to rid the beach of rubbish and other debris.
Mayor Ricarte “Dong” Padilla told MWBuzz since the clean-up, about 3,000 bags sacks of rubbish have been collected and brought to the municipal dump site near Larap.
The beach rubbish assault involved the local government and residents along the beach.
To attract more people to participate, Padilla offered to pay P5 for every sack of rubbish collected.
He also offered to convert every bag of rubbish into points which could be exchanged with school materials such as notebooks, writing pads, paper, pencils and ball pens, among others.
The campaign is using a tractor-pay loader to dig up debris that have been embedded in the sand for years.
At first a carabao was used to drag a heavy metal rake across the beach to unearth buried rubbish, but was stopped as the beast had a hard time doing it.
Artem Andaya, a town councillor tasked to oversee the beach rehab, told MWBuzz it was heartening to see the villagers spend time to clean the beach.
“The beach residents are now aware on the need to protect the shore from pollution because it would be them to benefit later.”
Andaya, who requested to be relieved of other council duties, comes to the beach every day to supervise the collection of garbage that included plastic and  paper materials, diapers, sanitary napkins and many other household rubbish.
The cleaning of the beach is carried out every day.
“It could take another year to retrieve all the rubbish buried in the sand and mud,” he said.
The other problems persist, Andaya said.
“Coastal barangays such as Malapayungan, Calero, Sta Milagrosa, Pag-asa, Osmena continue to dump their rubbish into the bay.”
He said bulk of the rubbish they would retrieve every day from the bay water were diapers and plastic materials.
So far, the stretch of the sand from the Larap road to the mouth of the mangrove river at South Poblacion-Parang looks neat, pleasing those who happened to walk the beach.
“Maganda nang tingnan ang beach natin,” a recent visitor said.
Padilla said another source of rubbish that ended up in the bay were the “pakatan” households in Plaridel and Parang sitting on the river banks.
He said: Nilagyan po naming ng lambat ang tapat ng tulay ng Parang.
“Paghibas po ng dagat, mga basurang galing po sa pakatan households ay nahuhuli ng lambat na ito.
“Alam po ba ninyo ang karaniwang nakukuha naming --- dumi ng tao …”
He said that rubbish including human wastes is retrieved every day, adding that there is somebody assigned to do the retrieving job.
“Kaya kawawa naman po ang taong gumamagawa nito dahil masyado siyang na-e expose sa dumi (ng tao)…”
A resident has confirmed Padilla’s observation.
She said: Iyan pong mga tubo (pipes) ng toilet nila ay dumederetso sa tubig at doon nahuhulog and dumi …”
Two households in “pakatan” have asked MWBuzz to help them relay to Padilla their urgent need to have a public toilet in their area.
“Matagal na po naming inilapit ito kay Baranggay Parang Chairman Willie Relao na sana lagyan ng public toilet dito po sa lugar namin, pero hanggang ngayon wala pong aksyon.
“Tuwing babanggitin po naming ito sa kanya, pangisi-ngisi lang po ito,” they said, adding that the “pakatan” public toilet project was among those that he promised to act on.
Padilla said he has laid down a plan to resolve this and it will be carried out soon.
Although he described the plan to MWBuzz in details, he requested the online newsletter not to report it yet.



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