President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and House Speaker Martin Romualdez have been going around the country distributing government assistance in the form of cash, rice, medicines, farm implements, seeds, fertilizer, canned goods and land ownership titles under the agrarian reform program.
Helping them in this initiative are the secretaries of various departments such as health, agriculture, social welfare and development, labor and employment, trade and industry, etc.
This effort is most pronounced and focused on Tacloban City, Leyte province, and the rest of Eastern Visayas.
Here are just a few of these assistance-giving activities reported in government media. The DSWD in partnership with the Tingog party-list of the Speaker’s wife distributed cash assistance to some 1,199 agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) under the Assistance to Individuals in Crisis Situation (AICS). Financial aid of P5,000 was given to beneficiaries in Northern Samar, Western Samar, Southern Leyte, and Leyte.
Speaker Romualdez’s office recently doled out cash to some 530 athletes in Tacloban City and the first district of Leyte.
Just this month, President Marcos and DSWD Secretary Rex Gatchalian distributed assistance to 8,930 farmers, fisherfolk and their families in the provinces of Samar and Leyte. They gave each beneficiary P10,000 through the Ayuda sa Kapos ang Kita Program (AKAP).
Also this month, 12 local government units in Western Samar stand to benefit from the government’s Project Local Adaptation to Water Access (LAWA) and Breaking Insufficiency through Nutritious Harvest for the Impoverished (BINHI).
And then, there’s the signing of the DSWD Region 8 and its national government and private sector partners for a holistic project on job creation, the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP). Thousands of residents in the region stand to benefit from his collective commitment to promote, strengthen, and sustain partnerships for the continued innovations of the SLP program in Region 8.
It is understandable that the national government poured much of its assistance and services to Eastern Visayas, the home region of the President’s and Speaker’s parents. It’s a love-your-own policy that is manifested by any homegrown leader who has arrived at the very top.
The question begging to be asked, however, is will all these “ayuda” be sustained? Or is it just “ningas kugon?” Which is to say, will it be only in aid of reelection?
#WeTakeAStand #OpinYon #OpinYonEditorial #GovernmentAssistance #DSWD #AICS #LAWA #BINHI #PBBM #HouseSpeakerMartinRomualdez