DSWD rice in relief packs sold

TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines—An official of the Department of Social Welfare and Development in Eastern Visayas (DSWD-8) was eating in a small restaurant here when something caught his attention.

Nestor Ramos said he saw that at least 17 sacks of rice stacked at the entrance to the kitchen were marked “DSWD relief supplies. Not for sale.”

He said he confronted the owner of the eatery, Marchita Ygrubay, who admitted that the rice came from the relief packs being distributed by the DSWD to victims of Supertyphoon “Yolanda,” which hit the area on  Nov. 8 last year.

Ygrubay explained she didn’t know that buying relief goods was a violation of  the Philippine Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act of 2010 (Republic Act No. 10121) that prohibits the sale of relief items.

In an interview with the Inquirer, Ygrubay said three of the 17 sacks containing 25 kilograms each were her allocation as a typhoon victim. She said she bought the 14 other sacks from other typhoon victims at P600 each, “out of mercy.”

“They begged me to buy their rice because they have no money to buy medicines. I didn’t know it was illegal,” said Ygrubay, 52, who declined to identify the sellers.

Each family affected by Yolanda receives 25 kilograms of rice, 10 sachets of coffee, 10 canned goods and 10 packs of noodles from the DSWD every 15 days.

As of April 2, the DSWD-8 had distributed more than 541,000 sacks of rice to 280,968 family victims, or 1.4 million people.

On April 3, Ramos, clad in shorts, shirt and jacket, went to Ygrubay’s eatery on Salazar Street to check out reports that some small restaurants in downtown Tacloban City were serving DSWD rice.

Using his mobile phone, Ramos took pictures of the 17 sacks of rice at the restaurant before these were confiscated.

Ramos said the DSWD would file a case against Ygrubay for violating RA 10121, if the sacks of rice turned out to be stolen.

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