Sen. Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan Thursday said the aftermath of typhoon Basyang underscores the need for the government to upgrade the country’s infrastructure.

Pangilinan’s statement came a day after the death toll from the powerful typhoon rises to 23 and more than 50 persons remain missing.

“Our country cannot afford to be paralyzed the way we have been when Basyang hit,” Pangilinan said.
“We need to modernize our infrastructure so that our drainages will work, flooding systems enabled, power lines will not be exposed to the elements, and rescue operations will be more efficient,” he said.

Pangilinan said the Senate in the 15th Congress should give due attention to the modernization of the weather forecasting facilities of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA).

PAGASA came under fire after failing to predict that the typhoon would directly hit Metro Manila. President Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” Aquino III admonished officials of the weather bureau over his first disaster management briefing Wednesday morning.

According to Pangilinan, the Senate is willing to take into consideration the problems PAGASA has to hurdle in order to improve its weather forecasting capabilities.

“We are willing to sit down with people from PAGASA to discuss their needs in order for them to be able to predict more accurately areas that will be hit by typhoons,” he said.

Pangilinan pointed out it is imperative for Congress to push for an infrastructure modernization act with the help of the private sector.