*Homes suffered structural damage due to heavy rains in recent months
*Legislative assembly has more than 200 million dollars for disaster prevention sleeping
*Immediate future of natural phenomena is uncertain
*Last year the country endured the largest fires ever recorded in its history
*Legislative assembly has more than 200 million dollars for disaster prevention sleeping
*Immediate future of natural phenomena is uncertain
*Last year the country endured the largest fires ever recorded in its history
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NewsTranscript
00:00In Bolivia, 16 people lost their lives in the last two months as a result of the raining
00:05season, and more than 14,000 families were affected, according to the civil defense report.
00:10Our correspondent, Fredy Morales, tells us the details.
00:16Orlando is a teacher. In his spare time, he built his own house in the Lojita Bajo neighborhood in
00:22the city of La Paz, a neighborhood that, like Orlando, has yet to recover from a flood that
00:27inundated some 40 homes a little over a month ago.
00:34This is our home. We have built it to live in, to inhabit it, because we need our own space,
00:43so that we are not sometimes dependent on relatives who welcome us very affectionately,
00:48but we are not used to it.
00:50The house built by Orlando did not suffer structural damage, but others in the neighborhood
01:00were not as lucky, and are now part of a dramatic statistic that began two months ago,
01:05when the first rains fell.
01:10In total, there are 36 municipalities affected, 229 communities, 10,880 families affected,
01:205,133 families affected, a total of 16,013 families, 355 houses affected,
01:29194 houses completely destroyed, and 16 people have lost their lives.
01:40These figures, when the rainy season is just beginning, because here the popular saying,
01:44January little, February crazy, is repeated, do not make a dent in the opposition majority
01:50in the Legislative Assembly, where more than $1.3 billion in international credits are sleeping.
01:56$200 million are for disaster prevention.
02:02It was earmarked for rehabilitation work in the municipality of La Paz,
02:06in the municipality of Calchaque in Potosi, and in the municipality of Cobiha.
02:13Unfortunately, this credit was not approved by the Assembly.
02:17This has obviously led the President to make the decision to provide us with up to
02:21$20 million Bolivian pesos to be able to undertake prevention and containment work.
02:32Meanwhile, the immediate future of natural phenomena is uncertain after a severe period
02:38of drought that maintained in this region the so-called El Niño phenomenon.
02:45We have gone from a phase of El Niño phenomenon to a phase of La Niña phenomenon,
02:48which was activated in October and then went to a neutral phase. What will probably happen
02:52in the next months is that we will go to a Niño phenomenon phase, the warming of the
02:56surface waters of the Pacific Ocean. Let's see what's happened then.
02:59Last year, the country endured the largest fires ever recorded in its history,
03:08with some 10 million hectares raised by fire. The rainy season lasts until March,
03:14but these periods, due to climate change, are now variable and do not obey the calendar.