DSWD: 200k Yolanda victims still without emergency shelters

The Department of Social Welfare and Development has asked President Rodrigo Duterte to order a probe into the alleged irregularities in the past administration's delivery of shelters to victims of Supertyphoon Yolanda.

Social Welfare Secretary Judy Taguiwalo said the DSWD had found that some 200,000 claimants were not given emergency shelter either because there was no available relocation site or because they did not support certain local government officials.

A report of the findings has been submitted to Malacañang, Taguiwalo said.

Taguiwalo said the DSWD reassessed the previous administration’s efforts in the aftermath of the supertyphoon especially in the Western Visayas and Eastern Visayas.

This was after they received requests from farmers and fisherfolk in affected areas who complained that they were yet to receive their emergency shelter assistance (ESA) three years after the supertyphoon hit the Philippines.

"Ang main problem natin with Yolanda is while we have provided more than one million emergency shelter assistance to the victims, there are around 200,000 claimants who expressed the complaint that they were victims of Yolanda in Region 8 and Region 6 but they were not given the assistance needed,” Taguiwalo said in a news conference in Malacanang.

"There were people who were victims of Yolanda but who were not part of the political groupings of particular local government officials so they were excluded. We have that a lot,” she added.

Taguiwalo said there were also disqualifications the victims were still in the danger zones. —NB, GMA News