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Thursday, March 28, 2024

3 solons learn lesson the hard way

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THE chairperson of the House Committee on Housing and Urban Development and local officials of Zamboanga City on Thursday learned the hard way how it is to live in a government housing project built with substandard materials.3 solons…

Rep. Alfredo Benitez of Negros Occidental, together with Zamboanga City Mayor Beng Climaco and Rep. Celso Lobregat and members of an inspection team, were on their way to the housing area when the footbridge they were walking on collapsed, dropping them into a creek in sitio Hong Kong, barangay Rio Hondo.

“Nothing more can convince us that people left homeless as a result of the 2013 Zamboanga siege have become victims twice. We became victims ourselves,” said Benitez.

The fall happened while Benitez and the inspectors were touring the housing and community facilities built by the government for the Zamboanga siege victims.

Only minor injuries were reported.

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Benitez said pieces of evidence indicated that the houses and other facilities built for the Zamboanga siege victims were made of substandard materials and were poorly designed.

The lawmaker previously sought a congressional inquiry into the integrity of housing projects for families rendered homeless following man-made and natural disasters.

He said residents of the houses built by contractors of the National Housing Authority are assured of immediate action on their complaints about the substandard housing units awarded them.

Benitez and the housing panel experts also inspected the sanitation, ventilation and power facilities in the Zamboanga City relocation communities for displaced city residents.

He lamented that victims of both the Zamboanga siege and Typhoon “Yolanda” in Samar and Leyte were forced to contend with poorly-built houses that government contractors offered.

“In the case of Zamboanga, the government allocated P1.5 billion for the construction of 6,343 houses under the Zamboanga City Roadmap to Recovery and Rehabilitation [Z3R],” Benitez said.

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