DSWD-7 regional director Mercedita Jabagat made the announcement recently and said the program’s new provision has been approved under the General Appropriations Act for CY 2015. She said more senior citizens will now benefit from the pension.
Based on the guidelines, being an active member of any senior citizens associations is not a prerequisite to avail the financial assistance from the department, Jabagat said.
“I encourage the public to report immediately to the City or Municipal Social Welfare and Development Office or to the Regional Office if there are issues in the implementation of the program,” she said.
DSWD-7 Information Officer Kerwin Macopia also said that the pension is one of DSWD’s social protection programs that provides P500 monthly stipends for eligible indigent senior citizens and those qualified are 65-years old and above; frail, sickly or have disability; not receiving pension from Social Security System, Government Service Insurance System, or Veterans Pension and do not have permanent source of income or regular support from relatives.
“The monthly financial assistance aims to help them in their basic needs such as medicines and food,” Macopia said.
Macopia said local government units can now also directly distribute the monthly stipend to the indigent senior citizens whose names are officially listed in the consolidated order of payment.
There are 34 LGUs currently that can distribute stipends to senior citizens for they have no unliquidated funds from DSWD, he said.
He said for 2015, DSWD regional office has added 18,258 social pensioners to the previous 34,792 with a total of 53,050 beneficiaries for the program. (MBCN, JSME)
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