BAGUIO CITY?Vice President Jejomar Binay on Saturday asked Baguio and Benguet residents displaced by last year?s Typhoon ?Pepeng? to help themselves by securing housing loans to build their own resettlement sites because a subsidy from the National Housing Authority (NHA) was no longer feasible.

Chito Cruz, NHA general manager, admitted at a public forum here that a promised relocation fund meant for Pepeng victims has not been appropriated.

Binay is chair of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC), which supervises overall housing agencies, including NHA.

He asked Benguet Gov. Nestor Fongwan, Tublay Mayor Ruben Paoad and Baguio Councilor Isabelo Cosalan Jr. to help typhoon victims secure a loan from the Home Development Mutual Fund (Pag-Ibig Fund) so displaced residents can resettle themselves given the poor state of the national funds.

He said the housing agencies plan to recruit private donors to help fund resettlement projects, but may rely solely on victims themselves using the model provided by the civic organization Gawad Kalinga.

?Why not use Pag-Ibig [Fund] if we are not assured of [a housing subsidy] from government. We can approve [loans ranging] from P80,000 to P100,000 and we can build model homes styled after Gawad Kalinga. [Their model is] to have the beneficiaries build their own homes to bring down labor costs. Let us think about this,? he said.

This resettlement approach will not be popular, Binay said, because the Pag-IBIG Fund is under investigation for approving allegedly anomalous loans.

But helping victims help themselves is the best option with the government?s belt-tightening, Binay said.

Records from the National Disaster Coordinating Council showed that more than 800,000 families were displaced by flash floods and landslides triggered by heavy rains accompanying Typhoon Pepeng last year in Luzon, including Metro Manila and the Cordillera Administrative Region.

The NHA had promised to subsidize resettlement sites in the Benguet towns of Tuba (445 houses) and Tublay (132 houses), and in Peñarrubia, Abra (133 houses).

It also promised to help victims of the landslide in Little Kibungan, a community in La Trinidad, Benguet, where 76 people died, provided its local government could find a suitable site.

Paoad said the Tublay government completed all prerequisites for its resettlement site but had not heard from the NHA since last year.

Binay apologized on behalf of the government.

?It will be a long wait before the government can determine whether it has money for the post-Pepeng rehabilitation and resettlement program. The national government?s dilemma is that it has to deal with so many problems all over the country,? he said.

The government has also been unable to start restoration work on infrastructure damaged by Pepeng.

In the Cordillera, government needs to raise P2.9 billion to restore or repair damaged roads and bridges.

Binay asked local officials to turn instead to their own business and civic sectors to see who may help.

?There may be people who can afford to pay for housing. There?s hardly any individual anymore without P500 in their pockets. Look at the smokers, the people with vices. Their expenses are even higher than the amount you pay each month for a housing loan,? Binay said.

He said the HUDCC may find a way to reduce the repayment scheme for Pag-Ibig loans and has pegged monthly obligations for typhoon victims at P350 to P400. Vincent Cabreza, Inquirer Northern Luzon