RESPONDING to complaints that missing persons are not well taken cared of, Manila Mayor Joseph E. Estrada has ordered the Manila Department of Social Welfare (MDSW) to conduct an inventory of them, as well as all rescued and homeless people, under the custody of barangay officials and police authority.
The local chief executive said there is a need for an updated profiling to determine what intervention the city government will do for their proper care.
“You should have an effort to take care of them and report to the city welfare officer so they will be brought to our shelter homes for them to be fed, clothed and cured,” he said.
Just recently, the MDSW personnel and some department heads of the City Hall inspected the vicinities around the City Hall, Liwasang Bonifacio, pier, the districts of Binondo and Tondo, and downtown area to check on people on the streets and living under the trees, overpass and abandoned buildings.
Estrada ordered Chief Supt. Joel Napoleon Coronel, director of Manila Police District, and Arsenic Lacson, chief of Manila Barangay Bureau, to remind police officers and barangay officials to help missing children and abandoned senior citizens and report them to the MDSW for intervention.
“The city has a sustainable social and health program for them,” Estrada said of the local government’s initiatives to help the missing and homeless people become active members of society again.
For instance, minors and youth are brought to the Manila Boys Town Complex in Marikina City. Under the care of MDSW, rescued individuals might get state-initiated livelihood and educational assistance.
“We in the city government are very conscious about their welfare and well-being. We want them to have a new life,” he noted.
The city government had conducted several rescue operations in the past, but the street dwellers continued to go back on the streets.
In response, Estrada had ordered the department heads to form their own teams and have an assigned area to monitor the presence of street dwellers.
The mayor also tasked the MDSW to meet with the representatives of the city police and barangay officials to draft plans on how to deal with the homeless, missing children and street dwellers.