LAWMAKERS this week reported that the two large telecommunications companies, PLDT and Globe, failed to send out storm alerts to mobile phone users as required by law during the last typhoon.
Bayan Muna party-list Rep. Carlo Isagani Zarate and Senator Grace Poe say the carriers failed to comply with the Free Mobile Disaster Alerts Act of 2014 and its implementing rules and regulations that were approved in 2015.
The 2014 law mandates telecommunications companies to send out free alerts at intervals to subscribers “in the event of an impending tropical storm, typhoon, tsunami, or other calamities.”
The law’s implementing rules require the NDRRMC to send a warning to telecommunications companies for dissemination to subscribers. The National Telecommunications Commission is then expected to monitor if the messages were sent.
But Zarate, one of the sponsors of the law, said he checked in areas heavily affected by Super Typhoon “Lawin” and found that many phone users had received no text alerts. This was also the case during Typhoon “Karen,” he said, when he was in Bicol when the storm hit.
Zarate said the law prescribes that alerts be sent before, during and after the disaster—something that did not happen.
Poe noted the same lack of text message alerts in Metro Manila, which had been put under Storm Signal No. 1—adding that there was no excuse for the telecommunications giants not to comply with the law in the capital.
But PLDT and Globe insist that they were not remiss in their duties.
Globe said it sent “at least three alerts” through the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council to warn of an impending disaster to subscribers who live near the affected area.
PLDT and Globe also said they followed the NDRRMC directive to send out alerts only in areas directly in the typhoon’s path. That meant that Metro Manila subscribers received no alerts because the storm, at Signal No. 1, had not reached “disaster level” here.
Under the law, the alerts shall consist of up-to-date information from relevant agencies and sent directly to mobile phone subscribers located near and within the affected areas. It adds that the alerts should include the contact information of local government units and other agencies that are required to respond to the situation.
Other relevant information may include evacuation areas, relief sites, and pick-up points.
Tellingly, the deputy commissioner of the NTC said his agency could not confirm whether the NDRRMC actually sent out the alerts, even though the law requires it to monitor compliance.
Clearly, the situation leaves much to be desired.
Are we to take the telecommunications companies, which have had a spotty record of public service, at their word that the messages were indeed sent out, even though the agency that is supposed to be monitoring compliance fails to do so?
Poe has filed a Senate resolution seeking clarification of how the law is being carried out, if at all. It is high time.