Navotas squatters beg for in-city relocation

At least 100 families displaced by the Department of Public Work and Highways (DPWH) road-widening project on Road 10 in Navotas City appealed yesterday to concerned government agencies for in-city relocation.

“Our houses were demolished two years ago but until now some 100 families here are still waiting for the promised in-city relocation,” Melinda Lalata, 43, told The STAR.

Lalata said several of her fellow temporary settlers preferred to build makeshift huts by the side of the road rather “than go to a relocation in Bitungol, Bulacan where we could not find a source of income.”

“My husband is a porter at the pier and that’s our only means of livelihood. So why go to Bulacan? It’s better to stay here so we could survive,” Lalata said.

Reynaldo Goingco, 52, a pedicab driver, said life at the Bulacan relocation is “more difficult compared to where we are now.”

“I’m a pedicab driver, where could I ply my pedicab in the provincial relocation?” he asked.

At Road 10 in Barangay North Bay Boulevard South (NBBS), Navotas City, Goingco used to ferry mostly students and fish traders at the fish port complex.

“We are appealing for in-city relocation so that we could continue with our livelihood and continue to live,” he said.

He said that the city government also promised them relocation in Barangay Tanza, “but two years had gone (and) nothing was heard of it yet.”

In Caloocan City, Mayor Enrico Echiverri has been working for relocation of thousands of squatter families affected by the Philippine National Railway (PNR) rehabilitation projects.

Last week, about 100 families living near the railroad tracks from Sangandaan to 2nd Avenue were brought to the Northville II-B resettlement site in Barangay 171.

The relocation is near schools and markets and has ample supply of water and electricity, Echiverri said.

At least 10,000 families in Caloocan City, Malabon and Valenzuela living near the PNR tracks were displaced by the multibillion-dollar railway improvement project and many of them suffer the same fate as the Road 10 dwellers in Navotas.