Philippine NGO Council on Population, Health and Welfare Inc.

COTABATO CITY, Oct. 18 (PNA) -– Cotabato City residents, heavily affected by flooding last month and last year joined on Sunday the global campaign "to stand up against poverty" by holding a half-day clean-up drive around the city.

Spearheaded by the city government of Cotabato, the Notre Dame Broadcasting Corporation, the Philippine NGO Council on Population, Health and Welfare Inc. and United Nations Population Fund, some 5,000 residents went out of their homes and cleaned up drainage canals and esteros and cut grasses beginning at 6:00 a.m.

Applying the local officials' know-how on solid waste management, villagers were taught to segregate the biodegradable and non-biodegradable materials.

“This is our contribution to the continuing global warming, we should continue to stand up against poverty by protecting our environment,” Cotabato City Mayor Muslimin Sema said.

Bai Sandra Sema, who chairs the Cotabato City Tourism Council, said the clean-up drive was a noble undertaking by groups, non-governmental organizations and individuals to save Cotabato City from flooding.

Last year and this year, the city’s 32 out of 37 villages were submerged by flood water, displacing some 22,000 people.

Dubbed “Labanan ang Kahirapan, Linisin ang Kapaligiran, Now Na!” (Fight poverty, clean our environment now!) the residents also vowed to make the general clean-up drive a weekly activity.

“The beneficiaries of this clean-up drive are us and no other,” Village chair Sumael Sekak of Barangay Rosary Heights 12 said as he led his constituents in clearing up esteros and canals of plastic materials that clogged the water flow.

“This is hitting several birds with one stone,” was how Nikki Lintongan, a local radio announcer, described the activity.

“By cleaning our surroundings, we save ourselves from various diseases, provide us clean environment and kill breeding places of dengue-causing mosquitoes, among others,” she said, noting that people from all walks of life made their family day a clean-up day.

"You see fathers, mothers, children, soldiers, policemen, vendors, rich and poor, joining hands and cleaning up their surroundings in this historic day," Mayor Sema said.

This city of about 300,000 people has been the catch-basin of flood waters from Rio Grande de Mindanao which emanates from the Agusan River.

Just an hour or two heavy down pour would submerge major streets and low-lying areas in the city, damaging agricultural products and other crops.

After the clean-up drive, the residents pledged to help the government achieve the Millennium Development Goals before 2015. (PNA)

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