DSWD unveils WB-funded ‘Kalahi’ program sans fanfare

The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) quietly launched the $100-million, World Bank-funded Kapitbisig Laban sa Kahirapan-Comprehensive Integrated Delivery of Social Services (KALAHI-CIDSS) program in Lanao del Norte last Wednesday.

The fanfare-less launch in Munay, Lanao del Norte was a departure from earlier plans to make it a much-publicized program of the administration of President Arroyo.

During the unveiling, Social Welfare and Development Secretary Corazon "Dinky" Soliman handed out some P3 million in KALAHI-CIDSS funds to the sixth-class municipality.

The program has a total budget of more than P9 billion with the government providing a P4-billion counterpart fund.

Under the program, the DSWD will distribute funds for three years to barangays of fifth to sixth-class municipalities to be spent on critical projects such as farm-to-market roads, irrigation systems and farm or fishery cooperatives, which would stimulate economic activity and uplift living conditions of local folk.

With the program’s big budget, it is expected that the number of beneficiary-municipalities will reach more than 5,000.

The initial beneficiaries are fifth and sixth-class municipalities in the country’s 11 poorest provinces — Quezon, Zamboanga del Norte, Lanao del Norte, Davao del Norte, Sarangani, Agusan del Norte, Iloilo, Ifugao, Masbate, Siquijor and Eastern Samar. — Rainier Allan Ronda