#TalkThursday: Post-Haiyan international aid

TACLOBAN, Philippines – Rappler talked to Bradley Mellicker, head of IOM’s sub-office in Tacloban in Leyte and Guiuan in Eastern Samar. We also have Sean Ng, director of the Haiyan Response Program at World Vision.

In November 2013, the strongest typhoon in the world in recent times hit the Philippines, decimating Tacloban City and practically the entire central Philippines. At least 8,000 people were killed and millions of displaced Filipinos were left seeking shelter, food, and medical attention. In July of 2014, nearly 9 months after the disaster, more than 14,500 Yolanda survivors still lived in tents, according to data obtained by Rappler from the Department of Social Welfare and Development.

Ateneo School of Government Dean Tony La Viña said the blame was not on Rehabilitation Secretary Panfilo Lacson or any other agency, but on a system “designed to fail for massive disasters.” (READ: 6 months after Yolanda: ‘We are failing’)

In the massive reconstruction effort, volunteers and humanitarian agencies like World Vision and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) responded to survivors’ needs alongside government. 

Before heading World Vision’s Haiyan response, Ng worked as a consultant for World Vision’s Humanitarian Accountability and Disaster Risk Reduction projects in South Asia Region. He was also deployed to respond in the aftermath of the 2011 East Japan earthquake, the 2004 Asian tsunami, and the 2011 Thailand’s floods.

Mellicker previously worked in Haiti as IOM’s Disaster Risk Reduction Programme Manager. – Rappler.com