More help from the ADB

Published by the Visayan Daily Star Publications, Inc.

NINFA R. LEONARDIA Editor-in-Chief & President

CARLA P. GOMEZ Editor CHERYL CRUZ Desk Editor PATRICK PANGILINAN Busines Editor NIDA A. BUENAFE Sports Editor RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete MAJA P. DELY Advertising Coordinator

CARLOS ANTONIO L. LEONARDIA Administrative Officer

The report that the Asian Development Bank has approved a grant of $20 million recently to help victims of super typhoon Yolanda rebuild their lives is very heartening, indeed.

This new amount is in addition to the $500 million emergency loan to the government, also intended to beef up its efforts in rehabilitating the areas that had been devastated by the calamity, whose residents had lost, not only lives of loved ones and their homes, but also their means of livelihood.

But the newest amount of $20 million is earmarked for specific purposes, and among these are to aid 70 municipalities that had been ravaged by Yolanda. The amount that has been sourced from the agency's Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction, will be used for such purposes as cash-for-work, with workers to be paid from it, purchase of seeds, fertilizers and other needs for farmers, fishing nets and boats for fishermen, as well as repair of schools in the chosen communities.

We hope that this grant will truly be used for the very purposes cited by the ADB, and that those local government units chosen to be beneficiaries will be very prudent and honest in dispersing this form of assistance. For several years, our country had been smeared with the reputation of being untrustworthy when it comes to aid that, in many cases, got diverted to uses other than those they were intended for.

Typhoon Yolanda can be an example of the saying that it is an ill wind that blows no good. Although it caused us so much in losses of lives and property it also showed us how much other countries and peoples cared for us, in that they generously sent aid in cash and kind in unimaginable volumes. Let us not squander this goodwill, and use their help so that they will be gratified when they see later how much their kindness had helped us recover, and even improve our lives.*