Yolanda survivors must be given adequate housing

TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines – While the city government is working on the reconstruction of the devastated places, Yolanda survivors who lost their houses must be provided with adequate housing program, complete with provisions of basic needs—water and electricity—and livelihood opportunities.

This was the declaration of City Councilor Jerry Uy during his presentation of legislative solutions in a conference on housing and resettlement, disaster risk reduction and management, national land use, and on issues affecting the poor and homeless survivors of Yolanda.

The national conference, held in Quezon City last week, was initiated by the Philippine Legislators’ Committee on Population and Development Foundation, Inc., together with the ICCO Cooperation, Oxfam UK, and non-government organizations for fisheries reform.

Uy, chairman on committees on laws, rules and privileges and on justice and human rights of the Tacloban City Council, was invited to speak in the event and share the city’s legislative efforts to address the plight of Yolanda survivors, two years after the disaster.

Uy said the City Council submitted last year Resolution 154 to the Office of the City Mayor and the Office of the Presidential Assistant for Recovery and Rehabilitation for consideration the proposal to construct a tenement building, similar to a condominium and within the city proper, as resettlement places for the survivors, instead of the sites being established at a remote barangay in the northern part of the city.

The proposed tenement building would be a six-level structure, constructed with international and national standards, with its ground floor open with stilts, which can be used as an activity area, not as residential spaces. Each of the dwelling areas, from the 2nd to the 6th floor, will have around 10 to 12 units for as many families, said the councilor.

Uy said the tenement building would be a better alternative to resettlement sites at the city’s outskirts. The building does not need big tracts, because a 2,500-square meter lot can accommodate two of these buildings, or about 100 units, compared to the resettlement area, which needed a hectare to house 100 units, he said.

In the council’s tenement building plan, a hectare of land can be built at least five buildings, equivalent to 250 units for as many families, and built within the city proper. This would also eliminate the need for reclassification of lands or conversion of agricultural lands to socialized housing zone, which required a very long and tedious process to accomplish.

“We also eliminate some critical activities in the suggested resettlement action plan such as road network alignment and road constructions because the roads are already available,” he said, adding that basic services and necessities such as potable water, sanitation, transportation and electricity are already available in the area.

Uy said, “There is no more need for government to build schools, health centers, markets, and other social services because they are pre-existing in the area.” The resettled families can continue with their present livelihood and employment because they are in the city themselves and near their places of work, he said.

The council further proposed that tenements units must be awarded to qualified beneficiaries. “Security of tenure is a key element of the right to adequate housing. Without protection, relocated families remain vulnerable to forced evictions and further displacement.”

As for the resettlement or permanent houses being built by the National Housing Authority until now, Uy said the City Council had no plans however to reject these, but proposed that these should be awarded to the family beneficiaries in the name of the spouses (both husband and wife) for them to have security of tenure.

Uy said the City Housing and Community Development Office reported last August that there were still 992 families, considered internally displaced persons (IDPs), living in bunkhouses built by the DPWH after Yolanda. The city government hoped they will be transferred to their permanent houses in the resettlement area before the second anniversary of Yolanda on November 8.

For temporary shelters, made of light materials, in the housing projects, of the city’s 1,481 units, 904 were completed, 254 are still under construction. Of those complete units, 613 are now occupied with 291 still vacant.

For the permanent shelters, the National Housing Authority have targeted to build 13,801 housing units for Tacloban, 5,298 units are partially completed, 1,448 substantially completed, and 650 units already 100 percent completed and ready for occupancy.

For the permanent shelters by the international and local non-government organizations, the target was 1,229 units, a total of 535 were completed, 132 still ongoing, 451 already occupied, based on the City Council’s inspection last month.

The city government, however, encountered problems in these housing programs: Not enough lands suitable for socialized housing; complications in expropriation of lands for the project; and the delays in land conversion from agriculture zone to housing zone, said Uy.

The councilor also said there have been issues on potable water and electricity supply to the housing sites. He said Republic Act 7279 (Urban Housing and Development Act) mandates the local government unit or the NHA, in cooperation with private developers and concerned agencies to provide residents with the following:

1) potable water; 2) power and electricity and an adequate power distribution system; 3) sewerage facilities and an efficient and adequate solid waste disposal system; and 4) access to primary roads, transportation facilities and livelihood.

Uy finally said these mandated provisions made the proposed tenement buildings in the city more feasible for the housing beneficiaries.

“It has been the right of everyone to have a standard of living, adequate for health and well-being of the family, as well as the right to adequate and decent housing. As such, the City Council had proposed to construct instead an on-site, or near-city resettlement with tenement housing near the city but outside the “no dwelling zone.” Uy added. (FREEMAN)