100K 4Ps beneficiaries face delisting by DSWD

By Cet Dematera

Some 100,000 beneficiaries of the government’s Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) across Bicol could be delisted to accommodate newly qualified recipients, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) reported.

The delisting is in connection with the latest report of DSWD Secretary Erwin Tulfo to President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in a cabinet meeting in Malacanang that an estimated of 1.3-million 4Ps beneficiaries across the country were evaluated and found as not very poor anymore.

Priscilla Saladaga, DSWD-Bicol Pantawid regional coordinator, said that Bicol at present has the most number of 4Ps beneficiaries at a whopping figure of more than 390,000 individuals.

Saladaga said that the delisting is being carried out every after three years to give the vacated slots to new deserving recipients based on the evaluation and assessment through the DSWD’s Listahanan program.

She said that from 2018, at least 67,000 former 4Ps beneficiaries in Bicol were already delisted and substituted by newly qualified recipients.

Major reasons for being delisted include the already improved living condition of a recipient family; beneficiaries had already exceeded 18 years old; misbehavior by pawning their cash cards; and perennially spending the cash assistance in vices such as drinking liquor or gambling.

Another reason from being delisted is when conditions for the cash assistance are violated, such as that the children beneficiaries had already stopped attending classes without valid grounds.

A family with three 4Ps beneficiaries could receive a monthly P750 health subsidy and a P600 monthly rice subsidy; while a child could receive P300 a month if in elementary; P500 a month if in junior high school, and P750 a month if in senior high school, but for only a maximum of three children recipients per family. An additional of P500 cash assistance is also being received recently by the 4Ps members.