A total of 32 more informal settler families at the Baseco Compound in Port Area, Manila will soon receive their own house-and-lots through the “Dubai” housing program of Mayor Joseph Estrada.
Estrada said they are only completing the documentary requirements before formally awarding the certificates of usufruct to the second batch of beneficiaries, who are all longtime residents of Baseco, one of the largest urban poor communities in Metro Manila.
“I hope it is clear to everyone that we are serious in providing every poor Manileño a decent home of their own, not in remote faraway place, but right here in the City of Manila where they live and work,” Estrada said.
He was elated to award the houses and lots to the poor beneficiaries, knowing “it will dramatically change their lives.”
“As the City mayor, I won’t stop until I have given the poor Manileños everything they deserve to have: quality healthcare, education, jobs, and most importantly, housing,” Estrada added.
The new homeowners will get to own units at the P44.5-million village in Sitio Dubai, Baseco put up by the city government February 2016 in cooperation with the Department of Interior and Local Government-Manila.
The 3.5-hectare site will provide permanent settlements to hundreds of ISFs in the impoverished community of close to 60,000 people. Each house has a 30-square meter floor area and can be extended with a second floor.
Estrada awarded the first units to the first group of 32 ISFs on August last year.
With usufruct rights, the beneficiaries virtually own the property for an indefinite period of time. However, they are strictly prohibited to sell or lease the property, or have it mortgaged.
Urban housing has been Estrada’s top priority since being elected in 2013.
On top of the Dubai housing project, the mayor has continuously implemented the city’s “Land-for-the-Landless Program” where the city government, through expropriation, buys private properties that are distributed to qualified applicants.
Under the LLP, awardees are given 20 to 30 years to pay for the lots at affordable rates; 269 beneficiaries have so far been awarded lots since 2013. For 2017, Estrada has identified 470 families as the next beneficiaries of the program.