TOMAS ASSURED: Elderly to receive incentives, even those not on City Hall list

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña yesterday assured that senior citizens will receive the intended cash benefits for them even if they were not included on the official list of beneficiaries as long as they are residents and registered voters of the city.

Osmeña made the assurance after several senior citizens trooping to the City Hall yesterday to claim their cash assistance went home empty handed because their names were not on the list of beneficiaries of the P4,000 cash assistance given to each senior citizen in the city.

Catalina Silot, 61, married, of sitio Living-Water in barangay Basak-Pardo, was dismayed after she was told by a city hall employee that she could not claim her benefit because her name is not in the list.

Another 61-year old banana vendor from barangay Banilad also claimed that she has already submitted to the city hall the required documents but still failed to collect her benefits.

Some personnel from the Department of Social Welfare and Services (DSWS) were assigned at the city hall lobby since last week to assist the senior citizens whose names are not found on the list of beneficiaries at the treasurer’s office.

Thousands of senior citizens or those persons 60 years old and above from the different barangays trooped to Plaza Sugbo in front of the legislative building everyday hoping to collect the cash assistance.

While most of them do not have problems, some encountered difficulties because their names could not be found on the list.

Last year the city distributed cash assistance to 25,000 senior citizens and another 7,019 elderly persons were also given the same amount of benefits last month, meaning there are 32,019 senior citizens in the city. But the number went down to 30,154.

Osmeña decided to grant cash incentives to the senior citizens saying he wanted to share the revenues generated from the sales of the lots in the South Road Properties. (FREEMAN NEWS)