DSWD pledges aid for Manila’s homeless

SOCIAL Welfare Secretary Corazon Soliman pledged assistance Tuesday to the families of street children who were taken off the streets of Metro Manila days before the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit and taken to the Manila Boystown complex in Marikina City.

Soliman promised that her agency would look into the situation of the families at the homeless shelter and “reintegrate” them into their communities if they so wished.

Several of those staying at the facility, however, have asked that they be allowed to go home, citing the lack of food and the loss of their livelihood. (See related story above.)

The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), meanwhile, took pains to distance itself from a report about the alleged detention of more than 140 street children before Apec week, clarifying that it was an initiative of the Manila City government.

Human Rights Watch, an international rights organization, said Manila authorities had “rescued” at least 141 homeless kids from city streets as of Nov. 10 as part of efforts to spruce up the capital for the international summit.

In a statement, Soliman said the DSWD-National Capital Region would coordinate with Manila’s Social Welfare and Development Office to look into the situation of the children and their families at Boystown.

“If the families who were taken to Boystown want to leave the center, then we will help the local government unit (LGU) reintegrate these families into their communities by giving them appropriate services,” Soliman said.

As of Tuesday, a team has been dispatched to the facility to check on their status, she added.

Soliman gave her assurance that both the local and national governments had “no intention” of detaining street dwellers, and only wished to provide them government services to keep them off the streets.

She earlier insisted that the DSWD’s “reach-out” operations for street vagrants was not related to the Apec meet, adding that those who were taken off the streets have a chance of being included in the government’s Modified Conditional Cash Transfer (MCCT) Program.

Under the 4-year-old MCCT program, an indigent family may receive up to P4,000 in monthly rental support payments for up to six months to a year. The number of beneficiary families has reached more than 4,000 in Metro Manila.

The MCCT is an expansion of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) which provides a complete package of assistance to street families, including responsive shelter program, access to social services and economic opportunities for the improvement of their living conditions.

Soliman said the reach-out operations were a year-round, 24/7 effort of the DSWD in coordination with LGUs and with street facilitators at the frontline.

In a related development, the DSWD chief said she recently engaged some 25 street vendors plying their wares on Kalaw Street, Manila who had benefited under the MCCT program.

The DSWD also released the testimonies of some of the beneficiaries of the program, including Mericel Quintana, who said she had benefited from a food cart donated by the government agency.