THE camp of Vice President Jejomar Binay on Sunday said 55,496 indigent senior citizens in Metro Manila, Bicol, Western Visayas, Eastern Visayas, Soccsksargen and Caraga did not receive their pensions totaling P335.738 million in 2014.
“The failure of the Department of Social Welfare and Development to distribute the funds to our senior citizens defeated the purpose of the program called Social Pension for Indigent Senior Citizens, which was supposed to help make life better for our elders who are very close to the Vice President’s heart,” Binay spokesman Joey Salgado said.
He said that in the Commission on Audit’s 2014 report on the department, 48 percent of the beneficiaries did not get the government assistance.
Of the 116,637 SPISC beneficiaries, 55,496 failed to claim their pension amounting to P335.738 million, the commission reported.
Salgado said Binay was urging the department to improve the system to ensure the immediate release of cash grants to senior citizens for their medical and other needs.
“The delayed delivery of cash grants to the intended senior citizens resulted in the accumulation of unliquidated funds from the multiple cash accounts of the Divisions Office for Social Pension as of Dec. 31, 2014,” Salgado quoted the commission as saying.
The agency said that of the 116,637 senior citizens, 55,496 or 48 percent failed to claim their pensions totaling P335.738 million as of Dec. 31, 2015, due to the delays in the sending reports of validation of the list of beneficiaries by the central office to the regional office.
In the National Capital Region, 17,180 of 40,102 beneficiaries failed to claim their cash grants amounting to P14.404 million.
“The significant amount of unclaimed benefits was mainly due to the confusion of concerned officials in the inclusion of non-National Household Targeting System beneficiaries in the payroll based on the list submitted by the LGU counterparts in compliance with the newly issued Administrative Order No.4, but most of the qualified beneficiaries were not informed on the schedule of the payout,” the commission said.
“Some already have gone home to their respective provinces or were admitted in institutions for temporary shelter.”
In Bicol, no beneficiary received the cash grant despite a P64.892-million fund allotment.