"Living in Samar could be a matter of life and death."
"Living in Samar could be a matter of life and death."
To say that Samar is one of the impoverished provinces in the country might be an understatement. Living in Samar and being led by the province’s corrupt officials can be considered to be a matter of life and death.
Samar’s procurement of medicines is prone to abuse. The Provincial Government of Samar (which used to be known as Western Samar) has been criticized for failing to curb massive corruption that has allegedly hampered the province’s health services.
Samar Provincial Hospital is now the center of a massive corruption scandal where millions of pesos for medicines supplies were allegedly stolen. This weakens the quality of health services that lead to poor patients dying in Samar.
Records showed that the Provincial Government of Samar spent millions of pesos for the procurement of medicines, but these were allegedly lost to corruption.
For the year 2019, Samar’s approved budget for the procurement of medicines is P375 million. Almost the same amount was budgeted in the previous years.
However, the poor folk of Samar, when they get sick, have to suffer the lack of medicines, physicians and nurses to attend to them. And when natural calamities strike, such as super-typhoon Yolanda, their medical and hospitalization problems are compounded.
The poor are indeed badly affected, especially those living in remote and impoverished barangays who consistently complain about the difficulty of getting access to good medical services, facilities, and supplies of medicines needed in rural health hospitals.
According to a 35-year-old mother from Basey, Samar (who refused to be named for security reasons) “arranging to see a doctor might unfortunately not be as simple as booking an appointment.”
A recent survey said nine out of 15 people in Samar say access to medical care at the Samar Provincial Hospital is often negotiated through an unofficial fee.
The situation is made even worse since private clinics and pharmacies are owned by the government doctors who prescribe drugs for patients and then tell them that they can only get them in their private clinic or pharmacy (at higher prices) because the public hospitals have no stock.
The current health situation in Samar is completely indefensible—there is no action, no accountability and no sign that the provincial government is taking these problems seriously.
According to Board member Julius Mancol of the first district of Samar, the province has a lot of resources and if properly managed, there would be no health crisis at all, and poverty would be greatly reduced.
However, Mancol said despite adequate funding for medicines it hampers the delivery of health services because of the misappropriation of resources.
“Corruption is the number one factor that brings about the gap between the rich and poor in Samar and many became extremely rich due to corruption,” Mancol added.
Earlier, COA auditors exposed some alleged anomalous procurement of expired medicines which put to risk the lives of hundreds of poor people.
Auditors even found suspicious discrepancies between inventory figures and actual hospital medicine stocks and some had accumulated expired medicines.
The poor people of Samar feel powerless to stand up against the province ’s powerful Tan dynasty.
It was learned that whistleblowers were confronted with negative consequences for reporting corruption, which is why people opt to stay quiet.
Members of the Tan political dynasty with their political power allegedly enjoy a lavish life, while thousands of Samarenos wallow in poverty and are deprived of basic needs like food, health, education, livelihood, housing, and access to clean water and sanitation.
Eastern Visayas is the second poorest region in the Philippines and three of the provinces in the region are part of the 10 poorest provinces in the country: Eastern Samar (2nd), Northern Samar (9th), and Samar (10th).
The Tan dynasty is said to earn 5,000 times more each day than a poor Samareno would spend on their basic needs in a year.
Samar social spending on health, social protection, and education is, accordingly, “shamefully low” and this is reflected in very poor social outcomes for the people.
Some local officials allegedly use businesses to siphon money off state coffers, and many business tycoons have grown rich on the back of close relationships with top officials, and from juicy government contracts.
Ramon (not his real name) from Marabut said: “I am working hard just to survive, whereas the rich have everything. They can afford to go to private hospitals, while many poor people in Samar remain at home with ill health until the situation gets out of hand.”
When you don’t have money to even eat, you can’t think of your health—you only think of how to feed the stomach, Ramon said.
Just can’t help imagining how those people manage to stomach dipping into public funds when their very constituents are mired in hunger and poverty. How insensitive can they be?
Earlier this month the Sandiganbayan Fourth Division found Samar 2nd District Rep. Milagrosa Tan “guilty beyond reasonable doubt” over the alleged anomalous purchase of P16.1 million worth of emergency supplies in 2001. She was also perpetually disqualified from holding public office for violating Section 3(e) of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act.
* * *
Speaking of allegations of corruptions in Samar, the Office of the Ombudsman has issued a preventive suspension order against Guiuan Mayor Christopher Sheen Gonzales and nine other municipal employees pending the investigation of their case involving the reportedly anomalous implementation of Typhoon Yolanda rehabilitation projects.
Gonzales is facing a complaint for grave misconduct, grave abuse of authority, gross neglect of duty, conduct prejudicial to the best interest of the service, and violation of R.A. 6713, otherwise known as the Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees.
He is facing the complaint together with municipal accountant Adrian Bernardo; municipal treasurer Felicisima Bernardo; municipal engineer and bids and awards committee (BAC) chairperson Arsenio Salamida, BAC vice chairperson Esperanza Cortin, BAC members Danilo Colandog, Gilberto Labicante, Ma. Nenita Ecleo, and Felipe Padual; and BAC technical working group member Zosimo Macabasag. They were ordered suspended for six months without pay.
Guiuan was among the 171 local government units identified by the Department of the Science and Technology to have incurred damages because of Typhoon Yolanda, so it was entitled to the Recovery Assistance on Yolanda fund from the Department of the Interior and Local Government.