The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) has so far delisted some 187,000 beneficiaries nationwide from the ongoing revalidation of 1.3 million beneficiaries of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program or 4Ps.
In a televised briefing on Tuesday, Sept. 13, DSWD spokesperson Assistant Secretary Romel Lopez said the 1.3 million beneficiaries of the 4Ps who had been identified as “non-poor” are going through revalidation “just to make sure that those who will be delisted or will graduate are truly non-poor.”
“DSWD Secretary Erwin Tulfo’s order to us is to make sure that those who will be removed from our 4Ps program are those already capable and have moved past ‘their poorest of the poor status’,” Lopez said in Filipino.
In the initial data, Lopez said that 187,000 have been removed from the program. This includes those who have passed the “natural attrition” or those who no longer have children in their household and those who have voluntarily waived their membership.
“There are still more than 1 million beneficiaries that are undergoing field validation and right now we have already validated 22 percent of the 1.3 million. We have estimated that there are 93,600 beneficiaries that we can recommend to be removed from the program because they are non-poor,” he added.
Lopez said there are several criteria to determine the removal of a beneficiary from the 4Ps program.
“One is the natural attrition because you no longer have children in your household. Your family has been in the 4Ps program for seven years. If you have been tagged as non-poor because the state of your living has improved. If you yourself leave the program or waive your membership in the program and those what we call non-compliant,” he explained.
Lopez said non-compliant beneficiaries are those who have failed to comply with the program’s conditionalities, such as undertaking certain activities that are meant to improve the children’s health and education like visiting health centers regularly, sending the children to school, and attending family development sessions.