Physically-impaired children receive wheelchairs

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City Hall’s Division for the Welfare of Urban Poor (DWUP) yesterday distributed wheelchairs to 25 physically impaired children to allow them to move easily from one place to another.

DSWS chief Ester Concha said each of the wheelchairs cost more than P5,000 similar to what the City Hall gave to 50 physically impaired adults in Cebu City last October.

Leonilo Omayan, president of the Federation of Persons with Disabilities in Cebu City, said that the cost of the wheelchairs was taken from the P25 million budget allocated by the city for the PWDs this year.

Omayan told The Freeman that aside from the cost of wheelchairs, the P3,000 cash assistance given to each of the PWDs was taken from the P25 million allocation.

According to Concha, the distribution of the wheelchairs is on a first come, first serve basis. “Kadtong una nga mi-apply, maoy una nga nahatagan kay kaniadto pa man mi nga miaging tuig nanawat og applications, (The first ones who applied received the wheelchairs first because we have been accepting applications since last year),” Concha said.

All of the PWDs in Cebu City that are accredited by the DSWD already received the remaining P1,000 cash assistance from the city because they already received the initial P2,000 a few months ago.

The annual cash assistance for each of the PWD starting next year will be increased to P5,000.

Virginia Piccio, the DSWS employee assigned to attend to the needs of the PWDs, said the number of physically and mentally-impaired persons that are registered in the city had tremendously increased compared to the previous years.

Piccio believed that one of the reasons is the granting of city’s financial assistance to PWDs.

“Kaniadto ang mga ginikanan motago-tago ug mahadlok nga mahibaw-an nga duna silay mga anak nga PWD pero karon dili na sila mauwaw (Parents used to hide and do not want to be recognized that they have a physically-impaired child but now they are not ashamed anymore),” (FREEMAN)