Manila: The social welfare department has proposed to use biometrics in areas where corruption has affected the beneficiaries of the government's poverty alleviation scheme that provides health and school allowances to poor school children, a senior official said.
"We are studying the cost of biometrics in Maguindanao where armed village leaders reportedly get a portion of the money being received by beneficiaries of the government's conditional cash transfer," said Social Worker Secretary Dinky Soliman, adding the proposal will help her department succeed in implementing the so-called Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Programme (Bridging Needs of Filipino Family Programme).
Maguindanao is one of the poorest municipalities from the 20 poorest provinces in the country where the programme is being implemented.
In 2011, Soliman's department restored the government's poverty alleviation scheme in Maguindanao towns of Shariff Aguak, Rajah Buayan and Datu Saudi Ampatuan, following its suspension in 2010.
Meanwhile, Gina Rebato, a cleaner with four children aged, 10, 9, 6, and 1, has secured all the identification cards and other requirements she should present to the social welfare department in order to be a beneficiary of the programme. It gives 500 pesos (Dh41.66) per child who regularly visits health clinics every month, and 300 pesos per child who regularly attends school.
Rebato's three children who all go to a public school in suburban Quezon City could receive a total of 2,400 pesos, and her youngest who is also registered at the government-run health clinic could get a 500 pesos monthly health allowance.
"With the government's assistance for our children, my husband and I are able to provide better food for them," said Rebato.
"It will also allow us to save money for a low cost housing project," said Rebato who earns 2,500 pesos as a cleaner and additional 1,000 pesos as a laundry woman every month. Her husband, a construction worker earns 350 pesos a day. He does not get a steady work contract of 26 days a month.
Some three million families are enrolled in the government's conditional cash transfer programme. The government's aim is to increase beneficiaries to five million in 2014, Soliman said.
Although the government has already included the cost of the conditional cash transfer in the amount of 34.4 billion pesos in the 2012 national budget, the World Bank will still continue extending loans for the programme, sources told Gulf News.
