The Presidential Commission for the Urban Poor (PCUP) on Friday clarified that it has returned to the Department of the Interior and Local Government the unutilized funds intended for the beneficiaries of Oplan Likas program.
PCUP chair and chief executive officer Undersecretary Elpidio Jordan Jr. said they gave back the allocated funds to the DILG when the distribution period lapsed due to unavoidable delays.
Over 11,000 families relocated from danger zones in Metro Manila were promised financial assistance after they were severely affected by typhoon “Ondoy” under the DILG’s Oplan Likas program.
Only 3,000 families had received a cash aid of P18,000 each.
The funds were initially disbursed by the Department of Social Welfare and Development, but due to the closure of the agency’s project-based office, the financial assistance was reverted to the DILG and was later transferred after a year to the PCUP and the National Housing Authority for distribution.
PCUP, in a statement, said “sources also disclosed that the long delays in the process were due to difficulties faced by the DILG in finding the right agency to disburse the relocation assistance as well as the imposition of the election ban for the 2016 national elections and eventually the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.”
In 2016, at least P214.806 million was transferred by the DILG to the PCUP for proper disbursement of the P18,000 interim shelter funds targeted for 11,367 qualified informal settler families living along the danger zones under the Oplan Likas program.
When President Rodrigo Duterte assumed power, the finalization of the implementing rules and regulations took time and was only released the following year with the DILG was able to provide a list of the first batch of qualified beneficiaries of 66 out of the more than 11,000 in December 2017.
After a year, PCUP under a new leader began the disbursement of the interim shelter allocation with only 3,249 beneficiaries and the utilization of P58,482 from the program’s funds.
With the long delays due to difficulties faced by DILG in the tedious process of identification and validation of Oplan Likas beneficiaries, including the lack of enough administrative budget,
PCUP is now processing the reversion of P26 million from the first tranche while having returned the P119.606 million of the second tranche on March 21, 2019 to the Bureau of Treasury as stipulated in the memorandum of agreement between PCUP and DILG.