ANTIPOLO CITY -- Five residents are now in hot water and facing criminal charges of estafa and falsification of documents for collecting more cash aid than what was intended for them from the national government.
Mayor Andrea Bautista Ynares, in a Facebook post, identified them as Aljon Presnede; and couples Benito and Salve Alipayo, and Benjie and Vicky Acosta.
In the same post, Ynares revealed that Presnede was able to collect P8,000 ‘ayuda’ in total after he managed to collect P4,000 each from two different barangays following his submission of two separate application forms bearing the same name but using different addresses, one in Barangay Dela Paz, and the other in Barangay San Jose.
The post also showed two different photos of Presnede holding a name tag with the amount he received and the cash money he got as proof that the resident was able to collect from two separate payouts.
The Alipayo couple and the Acosta couple received P4,000 cash each. Both couples are residents of Barangay Inarawan.
The Facebook post of Mayor Ynares however, did not mention how the two couples managed to get through the supposed validation process of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) and the scrutiny of the persons in charge of the payout.
It is the DSWD that validates the names of the beneficiaries of the government’s financial assistance. Once validated, the list of names are then downloaded to the agency’s counterpart in the regional, municipal, and city level, then to the barangays. The payouts happen in the barangay level.
The post generated more than 400 comments from netizens, majority of them claiming to have not received any financial assistance from the local government since the quarantine restrictions were imposed.
On May 19, the office of Mayor Ynares named Conrado Cruz and Gina Gundran as the live-in partner who allegedly pocketed a total of P34,000 by falsifying their application for financial assistance.
Earlier this month, another live-in couple, William Perlas and Jonalyn Labios, reportedly refused to return the financial assistance in spite of being ineligible, prompting the authorities to file charges of estafa and falsification of documents against them.