Two typhoons

As I write this, the country is bracing itself for two storms.

One is a literal storm, a “supertyphoon” which will take the name of “Yolanda” once it reaches the Philippine area of responsibility. It was expected to enter the PAR yesterday morning and make landfall by this afternoon.

It’s not just the power of Yolanda we should fear, although, at a forecasted 241 kilometers per hour, it is already one of the most powerful typhoons to visit us in recent years.

More alarming, at least for this Metro Manila resident, is that weather maps indicate that Yolanda cuts a very wide swath through the country. Although it will enter through Samar/Leyte, it is expected to head north and exit through Mindoro. But its effects will be felt throughout the Visayas and even northern Mindanao, and as it makes its way to Mindoro, even the rest of Luzon will be affected by both its powerful winds and lashing rain.

Governors in Bicol, particularly the hyper Joey Salceda of Albay, were shown on TV directing preemptive operations to keep casualties and damage to a minimum. Residents of Cebu and Bohol, many of them still living in tents after last month’s earthquake, were frantically tying down their makeshift shelters and looking for stronger structures they could flee to if the winds and rain proved too powerful for their flimsy quarters. There were even impressive scenes showing government officials directing operations, such as newly elected barangay chairs overseeing the placement of rubber boats and banca in strategic spots to make rescue and evacuation operations easier.

And of course we have had the usual scenes of agency heads or representatives meeting around a table, pointing at maps, trotting out statistics and trying to impress one another with op plans and strategies.

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As a citizen, ever hopeful that the government will do right by its constituents, I want to believe in the frenzied energy of all these preparations. This, even if I suspect much of the running around was mainly for the benefit of TV cameras.

But experience has shown that nature has a way of trumping even the best-laid plans and the most determined officials. Have we learned all the lessons we need to have learned? It’s not for lack of practice. This is the 24th cyclone to visit the country this year, and the second to enter our borders this month. I should think that by now officials and agencies would have their routines down pat.

Still, I was startled to hear President Aquino’s spokesperson Sonny Coloma announce that

P-Noy still believed that, with enough preparations, “we could still have zero casualties” after the supertyphoon. Perhaps our President knows something we ordinary Pinoys, cowering as wind and rain lash our streets, don’t?

Still, it’s reassuring to know that our easygoing country folk also believe in the Boy Scout mantra of “laging  handa  (ever ready).”

“Mas  mabuti  na  ang  handa  kaysa  magsisi  sa  bandang  huli.  Mahalaga  ang  bawat  oras  para  magligtas  ng  buhay  (It’s better to be prepared than regret it in the end. Every moment is precious when it comes to saving lives),” Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II was quoted as saying during a meeting of disaster officials.

Roxas instructed officials in areas at risk to monitor “ang  galaw  ng  bagyong  ito  bago  pa  man  tumama  sa  lupa.  Walang  saysay  ang  paghahanda  kung  hihintayin  pa  natin  ang  pagtama  ng  bagyo  sa  Pilipinas  bago  tayo  kumilos  (the storm’s movement even before it hits land. Our preparations will be useless if we wait for the storm to hit the Philippines before we act).”

Here’s praying the Boy Scout in all of us prevails.

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The other storm, of course, we might as well dub “Typhoon Jenny,” the nickname said to be preferred by “pork barrel queen” Janet Lim Napoles.

As I write this, Napoles is scheduled to appear before the Senate blue ribbon committee hearing, and true to everything connected to “Ma’am

Jenny” since she hit the headlines, even this appearance has been preceded by complications and controversy.

First, her lawyer Lorna Kapunan, who has been called “the highest-paid lawyer in the country,” announces that she has left Napoles’ employ, backing out as her lawyer in both the illegal-detention and plunder cases.

Then Napoles says she might not attend the hearing because she has just lost her counsel, even if Kapunan said the reason she was dropping her high-profile client was that Napoles preferred to heed the advice of other lawyers in her team.

And, as expected, everyone has jumped in with their stopgap solutions, from calling on public defenders to counsel Napoles, to forcing her to show up with her own private lawyers and holding her in contempt if she’s a no-show.

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As you read this, you and I would know what transpired. For all we know, she could even have roped in supertyphoon Yolanda as an ally or an excuse, citing the impossibility of making it through the flooded streets of the Metro, preventing her from facing the senators.

But even if she does show up, I would bet that Sen. TG Guingona and the other senators raring to go after her will leave the chambers gnashing their teeth in frustration.

Napoles doesn’t strike me as particularly articulate. And what we have heard from her shows little proof of the brilliant operator she must be to have engineered a 10-year-old scam that has embroiled legislators, officials of regulatory agencies, local executives and even Catholic bishops.

This could be a convenient ploy, of course. And tattle-telling would not serve her cause. Unless, the sight of Benhur Luy across the hall so incenses her she jumps from her chair and lunges at her former assistant. Now that would be a show!