MANILA- Malacañang may partially lift the state of national calamity, which President Arroyo declared due to the two storms that entered the country in the last two weeks, her top aide said Wednesday.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said Malacañang is expecting from National Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr., who is also concurrent chairman of the National Disaster Coordinating Council, to submit his recommendation on the possible partial lifting within 24 hours.

Ermita said areas where the calamity declaration may be lifted are those in Visayas and Mindanao which were not directly hit by Tropical Storm "Ondoy" and Typhoon "Pepeng".

Ermita's announcement came after several senators and congressmen scored Malacañang for allegedly planning to keep the calamity declaration for 1 year. Lawmakers also raised possible abuse in terms of calamity funds.

With the state of calamity declaration, Malacañang effectively allowed local government units to enter into emergency contracts to augment its resources for the massive clean-up and calamity relief and recovery efforts.

"I was the one who prepared the proclamation. I never said it would be 1 year," Ermita told reporters during a briefing in Malacañang.

He added: "In the same manner that it was recommended by chairman of National Disaster Coordinating Council, Defense chief Gilbert Teodoro, we shall also await the recommendation of the chairman as to either lift it all together all over the country or lift it in some places that are obviously not threatened by the typhoon."

Ermita also insisted that there was a need to declare a state of national calamity then to prepare the whole country against the incoming "Pepeng" which was even estimated to be a "supertyphoon."

He said that after the government's experience with "Ondoy", President Arroyo felt that "there was indeed a need to be prepared ahead of time."

"We should not react only when the situation has occurred as to what happened in Ondoy," the executive secretary said. With a report from Willard Cheng, ABS-CBN News