‘Sale of gov’t lot won’t displace residents’

Mandaluyong City officials have assured the 20,000 families living on the 110-hectare government property where the National Center for Mental Health (NCMH) and Correctional Institute for Women (CIW) are situated that the proposed sale of the lot would not lead to their displacement.

Mandaluyong Representative Neptali Gonzales and Mayor Benhur Abalos told Welfareville residents they would be protected even if the transaction pushes through.

“It’s no longer a secret that the government [has been] trying to sell the Welfareville property in Mandaluyong… But our main concern is the area being occupied by residents,” Gonzales said in an interview.

Recently, a health group and the workers’ association of the mental health center held a rally to protest the plan to sell the government property which is being eyed for development as the site of residential and commercial establishments.

The groups learned about the proposal through the excerpts of a June 29 meeting among government officials, including Social Welfare Secretary Dinky Soliman, among others, which took up the “Welfareville Development Project.”

It was agreed upon during the meeting that both the NCMH and CIW should be relocated before July 2012, the targeted bidding date.

The Alliance of Health Workers Inc. and NCMH Association said the 10-hectare property being eyed as the new site for the health center was too small and could accommodate only 1,000 patients compared with its present  capacity of 6,300.

They added that the relocation would mean health workers losing their jobs in addition to a decline in government support for public health.

During the protest, they said they would gather a million signatures to strengthen their campaign to block the sale of the lot.

Mandaluyong officials, however, distanced themselves from the relocation plan.

“The decision to sell it or not [rests with] the national government. Our only request is to spare those occupying the lot outside the mental health center and Correctional Institute for Women,” Abalos said.