MANDAUE CITY – Three children beneficiaries of the Department of Social Welfare and Development’s (DSWD) Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) have recently volunteered in the implementation of the Social Amelioration Program (SAP) here.

Christian Maluya, son of one of DSWD’s modified conditional cash transfer-homeless street families (MCCT-HST) from Barangay Labogon here, helped in the encoding and uploading of SAP documents. He is known to be computer savvy.

"From giving of assistance to the encoding of beneficiaries’ data, our tasks are never easy for validators, encoders and the uploading team," Maluya said in Cebuano, sharing that they had to deal with SAP forms that were difficult to read, and had discrepancies which took time to verify.

Since he started volunteering in their community, Maluya said he has witnessed the untiring efforts of the DSWD staff and other people behind the SAP implementation in delivering financial aid to the beneficiaries.

Aside from Maluya, other 4Ps beneficiaries Aquelino Gandionko also from Barangay Labogon, and Cecil Mary Militante from Barangay Paknaan, also spent their time and effort to help ease up the burdens of the social workers in their respective villages in implementing the program that provides financial assistance to poor families amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) crisis.

These Pantawid volunteers helped in interviewing families, assisting some families in filling out the SAP form, and verifying information, aside from encoding, and other tasks involved in the SAP implementation.

Gandionko shared that volunteering tested his patience and commitment in dealing with people and identifying those deserving families for the emergency subsidy.

He shared the experiences he had at work such as when people thanked them and seeing the poor families happy while claiming their assistance.

Militante said volunteering was her way of giving back and thanking the government and the people for helping improve their lives.

She said she received harsh comments and complaints while volunteering, but seeing smiles from people that received assistance kept her going. “I saw how the program helps and brings happiness in this difficult time,” she said.

Emma Bantiles, DSWD-7 supervisor for the children volunteers, said these kids were a great help during the SAP implementation as the demand of the workload in the area was very high.

Mandaue City is one of the local government units in Central Visayas with the highest number of non-4Ps beneficiaries for SAP.

“They are very helpful even if they are not barangay workers. In fact, they even work until the next morning because of the overwhelming tasks,” Bantiles said.

She added that the 4Ps volunteers in their respective barangays were diligent, trustworthy, hardworking, and can perform any tasks.