Met by ‘fellow urban poor,’ Kadamay backs out of Rizal housing site

In this March 20, 2017 file photo, Kadamay members from the Bulacan towns of Balagtas and Bocaue set up a barricade in Pandi Heights III, a government housing project in Pandi town where the group occupied vacant units. — (PHOTO BY NIÑO JESUS ORBETA / INQUIRER)

SAN PEDRO CITY, Laguna — A leader of the urban poor group Kalipunan ng Damayang Mahihirap (Kadamay) has announced they will not push through with plans to occupy a government resettlement site in Rodriguez town in Rizal province following negotiations with existing homeowners who, they say, are people from their own ranks.

But the Rizal police director, Senior Supt. Randy Peralta, said on Wednesday, they would still monitor the area by setting up checkpoints just in case the protesters return.

In a phone interview, Peralta said they were “caught by surprise” when Kadamay members, who earlier occupied low-cost housing projects in Bulacan, began massing up, Tuesday morning, near the La Solidaridad Estates, a housing project of the National Housing Authority in Barangay San Isidro, intended for policemen and soldiers.

But Gloria Arellano, national coordinator of Kadamay, said the group had no plans of returning to Rizal.

Aside from the police, local government and NHA officials, as well as members of the homeowners’ association occupying another portion of the housing site, had also talked with Kadamay members and eventually dissuaded the group from returning to the project site.

“Those HOA (home owners’ association) members are poor just like us. We told our members that when faced by fellow poor dwellers, we’d not push through,” Arellano said in another phone interview, Wednesday.

According to Arellano, about 500 housing units are left unoccupied over the last eight years on the Rizal site. Each unit is just about 24 square meters while “some (houses) are already run-down,” according to her.

“For someone with a decent salary (like a policeman or a soldier), you’d rather not choose to live there,” she said.

The group has led informal settlers to forcibly occupy idle houses in Bulacan since last week. Quoting their group’s data, Arellano counted about 594,000 homeless families in Metro Manila alone as of 2011.  The group has recorded about 1,200 instances of demolition from 2012 to 2016.

Arellano said Kadamay’s campaign for decent housing would not stop until they see a viable and solid government action on their complaints.  SFM