Allocation for the government’s Quick Response Fund (QRF) is not limited to 30 percent of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management fund set aside as QRF, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said.
The government’s QRF is under Republic Act No. 10121, otherwise known as the Philippine Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act of 2010.
QRF are standby funds for relief and recovery programs so that situations and living conditions of people in communities or areas stricken by disasters, calamities, epidemics, or complex emergencies, may be normalized as soon as possible.
In a three-page legal opinion, the DOJ through Undersecretary Raul Vasquez stressed that the 30-percent allocation of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management “merely provides the minimum allotment owing to the nature and purpose of the QRF.”
“Without divesting importance to activities addressing disaster risk reduction or mitigation, prevention and preparedness activities like training of personnel, procurement of equipment and capital expenditures, the law will become futile and ineffective for its avowed purposes and intentions when needed assistance for people in disaster in the affected areas are left to fund themselves by reason of restrictive application of the provision of the law,” the DOJ said.
The DOJ rendered the legal opinion in response to the request sent by Undersecretary Ariel Nepomuceno, National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) executive director, seeking clarification on whether the allocation for the QRF replenishment under Section 22 ( c ) of R.A. 10121 is limited to 30 percent.
The NDRRMC believes that the intent of Section 22 ( c ) is to only set a minimum funding allocation for quick disaster response by designating 30 percent of the NDRRM Fund as QRF.
Nepomuceno maintained that there should always be enough QRF to address situations and living conditions of people in affected communities.