Vice President Sara Duterte visited memorial sites in Leyte to honor the victims of Super Typhoon Yolanda and the 1991 Ormoc City flash flood ahead of All Saints’ Day.
Accompanied by personnel from the Office of the Vice President-Eastern Visayas Satellite Office, Duterte went to the Holy Cross Memorial Gardens in Tacloban City on Friday.
Super Typhoon Yolanda, which struck in 2013, remains the most destructive storm in modern Philippine history, claiming thousands of lives and damaging 1.14 million homes.
”Nag-alay tayo ng bulaklak at nagsindi ng mga kandila, kasabay ng ating mga panalangin para sa kapayapaan ng kanilang mga kaluluwa,” she said in a social media post.
Duterte urged the public to remember disaster victims as the nation observes the Day of the Dead.
”Sa ating paggunita sa Araw ng mga Patay, isama natin sa ating mga panalangin ang mga kababayan nating biktima ng kalamidad at sakuna, gayundin ang kanilang mga naiwang pamilya. Patuloy tayong maging matatag sa gitna ng mga pagsubok sa ating buhay,” Duterte said.
Following her visit in Tacloban, the Vice President traveled to the Ormoc City Public Cemetery Mass Grave Memorial. There, she offered flowers, lit a candle, and offered prayers for the victims of the 1991 Ormoc flash flood, ahead of the disaster’s upcoming 35th anniversary.