The Cebu provincial government’s P10.5 billion rehabilitation plan will undergo Cabinet-level scrutiny before it gets endorsed for approval by President Aquino, Cebu Gov. Hilario Davide III said yesterday.
Davide said he may go with the officials of the Capitol’s Task Force Paglig-on within the week when they present the plan to Cabinet officials this Friday.
He said the Office of the Presidential Assistant for Recovery and Rehabilitation (OPARR) under Secretary Panfilo Lacson has yet to confirm the schedule of the presentation.
“Task Force Paglig-on chief Baltazar Tribunalo told me that the team from Cebu, the task force including me, was invited by Senator Lacson to present the rehabilitation plan before the Cabinet cluster,” he told reporters yesterday. Two weeks ago, the province’s rehabilitation plan received Lacson’s stamp of approval.
Effective
The rehabilitation chief said he would endorse the plan to President Aquino III without waiting for other affected localities.
Lacson lauded Cebu for being the “first to submit a rehabilitation plan” among the six provinces hit by Supertyphoon Yolanda.
But Davide yesterday said the plan still needs Cabinet approval before it is endorsed to President Aquino.
“He told me that we will go first because we were the first to submit. We cannot wait for the others. That’s why if this meeting pushes through, we will have to convince them that our plan is effective,” he said.
The Cabinet members, heads of national line agencies, will be tasked to implement the various projects identified in the province’s rehabilitation plan.
Recovery
Based on earlier reports, only P3.7 billion of the P40 billion earmarked for post-Yolanda recovery operations from the nation’s calamity fund were disbursed more than seven months after the calamity.
Davide said Tribunalo will also assume as the new head of the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (PDRRMO) on Friday.
“The task force is just an ad hoc so there is no need for him to leave it. Carmel (Ulanday) will continue to be his deputy,” Tribunalo said.
Tribunalo will replace former PDRRMO head Neil Angelo Sanchez who resigned last March.