REP. Arnel Ty on Sunday wondered if crooked local politicians in a number of “Yolanda”-affected areas were using cash from the government’s emergency shelter assistance to raise election campaign funds.
He also wondered if some victims of Super Typhoon Yolanda were being deprived of the P10,000 to P30,000 that they were supposed to receive to help them rebuild their homes.
Yolanda, the strongest typhoon to hit land in history, slammed into Central Visayas on Nov. 8, 2013, killing more than 7,000 people and leaving hundreds of thousands homeless.
Ty raised his questions amid persistent reports of alleged anomalies at the local level in the distribution of emergency shelter assistance by the Department of Social Welfare and Development.
“What really grabbed our attention was the case of a municipal social welfare officer in Panay who pretended that the money for the ESA won’t be arriving for months, even if the cash was already there, and then offered the beneficiaries early payment in exchange for a 16-percent cut,” Ty said in a statement.
“In effect, a number of beneficiaries may be getting scammed out of their ESA [emergency shelter assistance] by the individuals directly overseeing the distribution of the money at the local level,” Ty said.
Ty said the erring municipal social welfare officer in Panay visited the beneficiaries, told them a lie that the ESA had been delayed, and then brought in a lender who offered quick cash loans equal to 84 percent of the ESA, so long as the remaining 16 percent was withheld as interest payment for the supposed advance.
“It is also fairly possible that ESA-related scams like this involve or have the blessings of higher local officials trying to raise cash to pay for their election campaign-related expenses,” Ty said.
“This Panay incident tends to disprove the reports of loan sharks preying on ESA beneficiaries. Loan sharks are not needed because in many cases the cash for the ESA may already be there.”
The ESA amounts to P30,000 per family or individual whose house was totally destroyed, or P10,000 per family or individual whose dwelling was partially damaged.
Social Welfare said it had so far distributed P14.6 billion worth of ESA to 753,750 families in the Yolanda-affected communities.
