Promise to return on December to check progress  

TACLOBAN CITY – President Rodrigo Duterte has expressed dissatisfaction over slow housing development project for supertyphoon “Yolanda” survivors, prompting him to order concerned agencies to make significant improvement within a month.
Addressing a throng of local officials and typhoon survivors during the 3rd year anniversary of the monster typhoon at the mass grave site located in Barangay Basper, Mr. Duterte noted the problem of water supply in relocation sites and unoccupied completed houses in the northern part of the city.
“I am not satisfied. In three years, only few families were transferred to their permanent houses. The national offices, the respective departments, they’re only given one month to process the paper and it must be out. I will be coming up with rules that bind everybody, including government corporations,” said Duterte, eliciting applause from the crowd.
The Chief Executive directed Presidential Assistant for the Visayas Michael Dino to closely monitor housing projects and ensure that water supply project is done.
“I have to ask Dino to help. I want to see them in their new homes by December. I will be back in December to check. I ask everybody to kindly cooperate and do not delay government projects. You cut the red tape because I’m disappointed,” Duterte added.
Specifically, the President ordered the National Housing Authority (NHA), Department of Public Works and Highways, and Local Water Utilities Authority to address the basic needs of families in resettlement sites.
Mayor Cristina Romualdez was pleased with the Presidents’ pronouncement.
“I believe that this will be done with the President’s willpower to mobilize all concerned agencies,” the city mayor said.
The NHA reported that out of the 14,000 houses targeted for construction in this city alone, 7,148 have been completed so far, but only 1,564 units have been occupied.
There are nearly 1,000 households that moved to units built by private donors. The pace of transfer heavily relies on the availability of stable water supply, according to the city government.
Earlier, LWUA approved the P159 million water supply plan as a medium-term solution to the water shortage problem at the Tacloban North Resettlement Area.
Concerned officials met on Tuesday (Nov.8) to iron out issues related to project implementation.
Under its original plan, the project will run for six months while waiting for the implementation of the P527 million level 3 Tacloban North Water Supply Project of LWUA and Leyte Metropolitan Water District. (SARWELL Q. MENIANO)

Hit by “Yolanda”  

PALO, Leyte-The National ICT Confederation of the Philippines (NICP) is committed to help the region’s business sector especially in the area of information technology.
This was assured by Wilfredo Sa-a, Jr., president of NICP, in his remarks during the 8th NICP Information and Communications Technology (ICT) two-day summit held this town.
“To the people of Samar/Leyte, this is your time to rise and rebuild your IT/BPM industry. The National ICT Confederation of the Philippines and the Department of ICT are committed to see you back in business,” he said during the two-day summit which ended on November 11.
“We have seen tremendous amount of rebuilding. It needs more catalyst to help rebuild better and even faster,” he added.
Sa-a informed his audience that the IT/BPM industry has generated at least 300,000 jobs in the countryside since NICP has actively developed and promoted cities outside Metro Manila like Cebu, Iloilo, Bacolod, Davao, and Metro Clark.
Much of this success could also be credited to the efforts of then Commission on ICT which has evolved as ICT Office and now to the newly created Department of Information, Communication and Technology (DICT), he added.
Sa-a claims that NICP continues to partner with DICT in not only bringing IT/BPM jobs to the countryside but also creating new opportunities such as rural impact sourcing or home based outsourcing and encouraging our local techpreneurs to go into startups.
“Through the 8th NICP ICT Summit, we want the IT/BPM companies to rediscover the potential of Leyte/Samar through its people,” Sa-a said.
Engr. Edgardo Esperancilla, regional director of the Department of Science and Technology, in an interview said that this year’s national ICT summit attended by nearly 600 delegates from all over the country which carried the theme “Accelerate Growth thru Digital Economy,” is the first major national event after super typhoon Yolanda battered the region three years ago.
“This summit is spearheaded by the Regional Information and Communication Technology Committee-Eastern Visayas Federation for Information Technology (RICTC-EVFIT), in partnership with the National ICT Confederation of the Philippines, the province of Leyte, the city government of Tacloban and the Department of Information and Communication Technology,” Esperancilla said. (RESTITUTO A.CAYUBIT)

At a cost of P40 million

TACLOBAN CITY – The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) will build a P40 million warehouse for better storage of relief goods meant for disaster victims in the region.
DSWD Regional Director Restituto Macuto said the national government has already earmarked P30 million to construct the new permanent warehouse at the Government Center in Palo, Leyte.
“The proposed warehouse is safe from storm surges, flooding and pilferage. The location is strategic, hence, it will be easy for us to bring relief goods to needed communities,” he said.
Macuto said the new warehouse is badly needed since the DSWD regional office has been renting a storage facility in the city for P200,000 monthly located in Barangay Caibaan, this city.
When the region was devastated by supertyphoon “Yolanda” exactly three years ago, the said facility became the regional warehouse where food assistance were loaded and repacked for distribution for the survivors.
Patterned after the DSWD’s National Resource Operation Center, the warehouse will store rice, assorted food packs, blankets, cooking implements, and mosquito nets.
Macuto said that the construction of the regional warehouse will start next year once the needed money will be available.
“We (also) need additional P10 million for filling of the 5,000-square meter lot donated by the provincial government for the new warehouse,” Macuto said.
Recently, the DSWD asked funding assistance from the Department of Public Works and Highways for land preparation since the cost is not included in the original budget proposal.
The DSWD will enter a 25-year usufruct agreement with the provincial government which owns the more than 25-hectare Government Center which also houses several regional government offices.
The DSWD is pushing for the construction of new warehouses after an internal investigation by the agency found that the food packs and sacks of rice dumped in Leyte last year were meant for distribution to victims of typhoons “Ruby” and “Glenda” that hit the country in 2014.
About 200 sacks of relief items intended for typhoon survivors of Ruby and Glenda were dumped in a hole in Barangay Mac-alang, Dagami town.
The DSWD claimed that the dumped items were already spoiled and unfit for human consumption.

TACLOBAN CITY- Survivors of supertyphoon “Yolanda” from different towns of Eastern Samar staged their rally before the regional office of the National Housing Authority (NHA) on Friday(Oct.4).
The survivors claimed that it’s been three years now and yet the NHA failed to deliver its promise to provide them permanent houses.
Lita Bagunas from Giporlos town and member of the Uswag Este-Katarunghan, a group of informal settlers, admitted that while they live in areas identified as no build zones, they are still entitled to be provided with permanent houses considering that they are also Yolanda survivors.
The members of the group claimed that their houses, mostly made of light materials, were washed out when Yolanda battered the region on November 8, 2013.
Citing the NHA data, there are 7,573 families from various towns in Eastern Samar hit by Yolanda that need to be relocated to safe zones or be provided with permanent houses.
“My family still lives in a temporary shelter. Rainy season is coming and the houses we temporarily live is fast dilapidating,”Bagunas said.
The 200 survivors were from the towns of Lawaan, Balangiga, Giporlos, Gen. MacArthur, Hernani, Llorente and Maydolong.
The NHA has cited lack of titled lands and high cost of lands suitable for housing as the reasons why the delay on the construction of permanent houses for Yolanda survivors in Eastern Samar.
Bagunas, however, said that the exorbitant asking price for private lands that are said to have caused the delay could have been solved if only the local government units be given the right to exercise their power of eminent domain.
(MEL CASPE/RONALD O.REYES)