1,000 ‘Yolanda’ survivors set protest march during Aquino’s Sona

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — At least a thousand survivors of Super Typhoon “Yolanda” (Haiyan) are expected to flock to Manila on July 28 in time for President Benigno Aquino’s fifth State of the Nation Address (SONA).

According to Tindog People’s Network spokesperson Maritess Bacolod, the survivors will demand from the government decent permanent housing and livelihood, among others.

“It has been eight months since Yolanda devastated Eastern Visayas and despite the outpour of donations from the international community, the situation remains bleak in the region,” Bacolod, a relative of Yolanda survivors in Barugo, Leyte, said on Tuesday.

The temporary housing units provided by the government have been posing health hazards to the survivors as the floors of the units are constantly wet, according to Tindog.

In a statement last May, Budget Secretary Florencio Butch Abad said that at least P32 billion have been released for post-Yolanda rehabilitation efforts.

This amount was a far cry from the P137-billion budget of the Disbursement Acceleration Program, said Tindog and members of other militant groups who went to the Department of Budget and Management office in San Miguel, Manila, on Tuesday to demand Abad and Aquino’s resignation. The Supreme Court struck down the program as unconstitutional last week.

They also assailed the seeming “special treatment” the government has been giving to those accused in the P10-billion pork barrel scam such as Senators Ramon “Bong” Revilla and Jinggoy Estrada, both currently detained at the Philippine National Police Custodial Center, and Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, who has been confined at the PNP General Hospital.

Bacolod said the senators facing plunder and graft charges in the Sandiganbayan in connection with the P10-billion pork barrel scam have been much better off in their detention cells than the Yolanda survivors in evacuation camps and temporary shelters.

Yolanda survivors are currently staying in bunkhouses measuring 17.28 square meters, while the senators are staying in 32-sq-m detention cells in the Custodial Center.

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