PARTY-LIST Rep. Fernando Hicap of Anakpawis assailed Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II and Social Welfare Secretary Dinky Soliman in connection with the controversies hounding the release of the Emergency Shelter Assistance (ESA) fund for survivors of Supertyphoon Yolanda (international code name Haiyan).
Hicap said Roxas, the Liberal Party’s presidential bet in the 2016 election, is avoiding questions on the status of ESA, one of the many post-Yolanda rehabilitations response of the government.
Under ESA, a family whose house had been totally damaged will receive P30,000, while P10,000 is given for partially damaged houses.
The ESA program is implemented by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) in coordination with local governments.
“Roxas should answer head on the issues surrounding the implementation and distribution of the ESA. He cannot just simply shrug off the problems of the ESA distribution because the local government units play half in its implementation along with the DSWD. Evading a legitimate query, basically, is like abandoning state responsibility to all victims-survivors of Yolanda” Hicap said.
He said the Anakpawis party-list group continues to receive reports from local organizations in Yolanda-affected areas from Eastern and Central Visayas, Iloilo and some parts of Panay Islands, complaining against “kase-kase” scheme.
Under the scheme, Hicap said financiers get 16 percent of what the ESA beneficiaries will receive.
“There are also reports that loan sharks are directly claiming the ESA from the DSWD regional officers,” he added.
Hicap said Roxas should look into the complaints, as well as the practice of involving local governments that prey on typhoon victims.
Meanwhile, Hicap slammed the DSWD for allegedly concealing the real status of the ESA implementation.
He cited that in the National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council web site, as of April 2014, Yolanda-damaged houses totaled at 1.1 million—with 551,000 totally damaged and 580,400 partially damaged.
However, Hicap noted that under the DSWD Memo Circular 24, the total number of partially damaged houses was only 493,912, while totally damaged houses were listed at 518, 878.
The Memo Circular 24 is the DSWD scheme designed to set requirements in regards with the ESA distribution. The memo, he said, received brickbats for issuing unjust preconditions.
Under the memorandum, beneficiaries can only access the shelter aid by having a DSWD’s disaster family access card, did not receive any aid from nongovernment organizations, those who live in government declared safe zones, government and private workers receiving monthly salary of less than P15,000 a month and contractual government employees with no housing loans from the government and private groups.