Senior citizen representative wants all elderly to receive cash aid

Senior Citizens party-list Representative Francisco Datol Jr. on Monday called for a "second iteration" of the Social Amelioration Program where a separate aid will be given to all senior citizens, regardless whether they are already receiving pension or not.

"I am appealing to my colleagues in Congress and to the seniors among the economic managers of the Duterte administration. I ask them for a second iteration of the Social Amelioration Program (SAP)," Datol said in a statement.

"In this SAP 2.0, my appeal is to have a separate aid for all seniors, including pensioners, retirees, those already receiving indigent seniors pensions, and those among the 4Ps beneficiaries," he added.

Currently, Datol said that senior citizens only share an amount of the emergency cash subsidy with the rest of the low-income household they belong to.

He added that the P500 social pension that indigent senior citizens every month is already not enough to meet their needs, and the COVID-19 crisis only aggravated their situation.

In Datol's proposal under SAP 2.0, a P5,000 additional cash subsidy will be given to senior citizens living in areas under an enhanced community quarantine, while those who are in areas under general community quarantine will receive P3,000.

If a household in an area under ECQ has two senior citizens, each one of them will receive a cash subsidy to P5,000, he added.

"Wala dapat kahati na ibang tao ang seniors sa matatanggap nilang SAP 2.0. Automatic na basta senior ka, mayroon kang matatangap, anuman ang iyong estado sa buhay dahil iyong ayuda ay pandagdag sa kanilang pambili ng gamot at pagkain," Datol said.

"Ngayong nakita na natin kung paano ipinatupad ang SAP 1.0, makakagawa na tayo ng bagong batas na pang-amyenda sa Bayanihan Act, factoring in the lessons we have learned," he added.

Datol pointed out that under SAP 2.0, no senior citizen should be forced to leave their houses and claim their cash subsidies by themselves.

"Dapat i-deliver sa kanila nang personal sa pamamagitan ng door-to-door money transfer services ng mga pribadong kumpanya. Nakatulong pa tayo na magkaroon ng trabaho ang mga messenger ng money transfer outlets," he said.

"The DSWD and LGUs now have a database of all the households who received their SAP, including individual addresses and contact numbers. It should now be easy for them to release the second installment of SAP through money transfer," he added. -NB, GMA News