Prabowo from Cebu, El Niño, La Niña, and the Ring of Fire

Natural phenomena are difficult to predict and can become wrathful when nature is unfriendly, but also blessings when nature is cheerful. It all depends on humans! Indonesia is always hit by successive storms. Day by day, nature becomes more ferocious. A series of natural disasters, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and various events seem as if nature wants to convey a message to humans in this country that it is still alive and moving. In philosophy, it has been taught that humans are the real embodiment of a mini-nature, while nature is the manifestation of humans with living organs. Nature is alive and moves like humans. The United States and Europe experience natural symptoms like droughts that can bring positive impacts in the form of increased economic activity. Similarly, the rainy season, and the consistent relationship between rainfall and agricultural productivity also has impacts on health, as El Niño has been linked to significant effects on air pollution in East China. A study published in the journal Nature found that droughts may have played a role in 21 percent of all civil conflicts between 1950 and 2004, and that new civil conflicts in tropical areas are twice as likely to arise during dry seasons compared to La Niña. Because the scorching heat of the sun affects human nature, making it more wild and ferocious compared to the rainy season where humans shelter and ponder, building harmony under shelter, can enjoy gentle breezes in the mountains and swaying coconut trees on the beach. Researchers point out that economic pressures from summer, and also stress from natural disasters caused by drought, can suppress the human soul, which sometimes can lead to aggressive behaviour. One of the main effects associated with El Niño is the increased potential for fires in Indonesia as well as abroad, such as the legendary event, Ash Wednesday in 1983 linked to El Niño in Australia. Or the Black Saturday event (2009). In the past, humans and nature were eternal friends, mutually needing and depending on each other. Humans live by utilising all kinds of animals, birds in the air, fish in the sea, plants and everything in it, just as nature would be useless without humans, even mutually beneficial, symbiotic mutualism. Rural communities are humans who live autarkically, living from nature (taken for granted). Nature is not only a source of life but also a sacred source, a centre of spirituality, a transcendental source between humans and God the creator of the universe. From Cebu, Philippines, Prabowo wants to remind us that nature will indeed appear like a frightening spectre, but do not blame nature. We are the ones who must be ready to face it. Hearing words like earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, floods, and droughts should not be seen as threatening human life. These events should not always be associated as nature’s wrath, nature acting negatively, or nature committing crimes against humans. Why does Prabowo say that ASEAN and Indonesia must anticipate extreme El Niño? It means that human thought is not captive to negative framing about floods, droughts, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes that bring losses, negative impacts caused. But to see them as natural phenomena that bring blessings, positive impacts as consequences of the human life cycle in interacting with nature. We sometimes never appreciate this nature as a living compound! Various government reports always calculate the losses suffered due to disasters. The government always estimates the total damage and losses due to the tsunami disaster in Aceh and North Sumatra. Similarly, the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) always estimates losses due to disasters. From 2000 to 2001, BNPB once recorded losses due to floods reaching Rp 1.5 trillion. Even the Ministry of Social Affairs recorded that losses due to floods are two-thirds of the damage and losses due to other natural disasters. At the international level, the FAO records deforestation due to disasters at 1.3 million hectares per year. That is our view of nature. As if nature is so evil and humans suffer losses. We never calculate or see the positive impacts due to El Niño and La Niña. The people living around Mount Merapi, the glowing fire that emits light, spewing lahar and lava, become sources of fertility and prosperity. However, it is understandable if the human view of nature is so negative that it causes wrath, then nature becomes increasingly rampant. From Cebu, the President invites us, the educated class, to understand so as to do good for the marginalised. Why do the small people, the poor and slum dwellers, the inhabitants of riverbanks still want to stay and refuse to be relocated even though danger threatens their lives? They are not just urban dwellers, or migrants, nor circular urban migrants, nor homeless people, but they have economic activities on the riverbanks and receive benefits from floods. The state understands that river flow inhabitants receive benefits in various aspects; economy, social and cultural interactions, as well as ease and accessibility in supporting life that may not be widely known to the public. We are all captive to the bad stigma about the rainy season (La Niña) with the danger of floods and the dry season (El Niño) related to the danger of forest fires. A bad stigma of modern humans towards nature. It is time to reverse the thinking to the mindset of past humans that the rainy season and dry season are blessings, not merely wrath. Therefore, the taste of the community living along the river needs to be engineered so that the river basin areas become attractive, artistic, modern, and humane. Indonesia’s position is included in the zone called the Ring of Fire. That zone is very vulnerable to natural disasters (earthquakes and v).