Ex-Vice President and now senatorial aspirant Jejomar Binay slammed on Wednesday the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) for their failure to distribute Social Amelioration Packages (SAP) to over six million beneficiaries.
Binay, in a statement released Oct. 13, accused the DSWD of putting over five million Filipinos at risk of contracting COVID-19.
“At dahil walang choice ang mahigit limang milyong SAP beneficiaries, lumabas sila ng bahay para sa over-the-counter transactions (Because over five million SAP beneficiaries had no choice, they had to go out for over-the-counter transactions). Because of its indifference and negligence, the DSWD exposed over five million Filipinos to the danger of contracting COVID-19.”
Binay also questioned the DSWD and their mandate to serve indigent Filipinos.
“The DSWD is mandated to serve the poorest of the poor. But it is not even aware, or conveniently ignored, that only 800,000 of its six million SAP beneficiaries have smartphones. Paano nila matatanggap ang ayuda nila digitally kung ganito (How will they receive their benefits)?”
The DSWD is currently under scrutiny for their involvement with Starpay whom they contracted to distribute around P50 billion in SAP and for discrepancies within Starpay’s SAP distribution.