The Department of Interior and Local Government has directed barangay officials and the Department of Social Welfare and Development to address the increasing number of beggars in the country’s metropolis.
In an online news forum on Sunday, DILG Undersecretary Martin Diño said that beggars should be apprehended to prevent them from possibly spreading the coronavirus.
“The law is the law. The police should apprehend these beggars and bring them to the DSWD because we don’t know if they have already been infected,” Diño.
The DILG official said the numbers of beggars grew after they were joined by locally-stranded individuals, displace jeepney drivers and several others who have lost their jobs because of the ongoing pandemic.
Dino said that barangay officials and the police are duty-bound to apprehended these individuals and bring them to the DSWD to be taken cared of.