TACLOBAN CITY- Families now living in bunk houses located in Barangay Caibaan, this city, have expressed their apprehensions as to how long they would be staying at their temporary shelters.
The owner of the lost where the 27 bunkhouses are located have made it known that they are only giving up to June 30 of this year for the evacuees to stay.
The property is owned by the International Pharmaceutical Incorporated (IPI) which has put up on the entrance of the compound stating that the typhoon victims have only up to June 30 to stay.
IPI had stressed that they allowed their property be utilized as a temporary shelter for Yolanda-affected communities but never as a permanent relocation or resettlement site.
Needles to say, the decision of the IPI have made the 500 families comprising over 3,000 people, worried as to where they would live next if the day comes for them to leave the bunk houses which they now considers as their homes, albeit on temporary basis.
With the possible relocation site for the families not yet developed, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) said that the evacuees could stay at their bunk houses for at least two years.
The government has constructed three bunk houses in Tacloban, namely, at Abucay, Sagkahan and at Caibaan, considered to be the biggest of the three areas in terms of occupants.
Those living at the bunk houses have totally lost their houses, mostly located along the shores, due to the storm surges generated by supertyphoon Yolanda.
The DSWD point person for Caibaan bunk house, Agnes Bugal, admitted that there is no day that passes without occupants asking for clarification where they will go should IPI implement its deadline at the end of June.
Bugal said that the problem has already been discussed during the meeting at the camp management and coordination cluster of the United Nations. The solution identified was to transfer the Caibaan occupants to the 10,000 permanent housing units that are to be built at the northern part of Tacloban.
However, the permanent houses to be constructed are to be finished by December, six months short of IPI’s deadline.
Faster solution is to build another bunk houses near the area where the permanent site is located to make an easier transfer. However, this too will take some time to finish.
“All we can do is hope that IPI will at least extend their deadline because apparently the permanent relocation site will never be ready until December, there are potential solutions but time is a big factor,” Bugal said. (REGIN OLIMBERIO, Communitere)
