Though they were made to voluntarily dismantle their houses, most settlers of sitios Mahayag and Mahusay in barangay Subangdaku, Mandaue City are not leaving Mahiga Creek anytime soon.
Residents belonging to the Sitio Mahayag Socialized Housing Inc. (SMASHI) want to spend Christmas and New Year in a “Tent City” that they insisted won’t encroach on the creek’s three-meter easement zone.
SMASHI president Ester Diaz said they will ask Vice President Jejomar Binay to help them argue their case.
In a visit to Cebu last May 18, Binay said government financing institutions can be tapped to help urban poor settlers.
“Ever since dili mi supak sa balaod kung gipa-tuman lang sa gobyerno ang 3 meter-easement, apan dili man kami tanan 3 meters (we are not against the law on the three-meter easement zone implemented by the government. Not all of us encroach on the three-meter zone),” Diaz said.
In sitio Mahusay, settlers assembled at 8 a.m. yesterday in anticipation of the arrival of the demolition team.
For the families
They talked with Fr. Rolyn Vics, head of the San Roque parish and they agreed to allow the demolition for the sake of their families.
“Kami nga isip lumulupyo dinhi sa sitio Mahusay, nagkasabot mi nga mutuman so wala mi tutol sa inyong pagguba (All of the residents in sitio Mahusay agreed to obey, so we won’t defy the demolition),” said Maria Teresa Pitogo, a sitio Mahusay resident.
The demolition team accompanied by 40 policemen from the Subangdaku police precinct, firemen, a Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team and officials of the City Social Welfare Services arrived in the area.
Silence
Staffers of the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) were on hand to witness the demolition.
Pitogo spoke to Carlo Ybañez and repeated their request for a delay in the demolition but Ybañez turned them down, saying he was only following orders. One of the settlers asked for a copy of the demolition order which Ybañez failed to produce, causing some tension between the team and the settlers.
Vincent Guy Aquino, a representative of the Housing and Urban Development Office (HUDO) of Mandaue City Hall, later brought the order that was met with silence from the settlers.
One of them, 43-year-old father Ambrocio Roxas, dismantled his home within the three-meter easement zone.
Dialogue
“I’ve never experienced flooding here, somewhere in the SM area there’s flooding there because it’s shallow,” he said in Cebuano.
HUDO records showed that 112 out of 162 families in sitio Mahusay relocated to Pakna-an while 50 families availed of the P10,000 cash aid.
For their part, Diaz said they want a dialogue with Mandaue City officials and ask them to set up a relocation site for their members near
Mahiga Creek that they plan to call as a “Tent City.”
She said their group stands by its position that the Oct. 7 demolition in their area was illegal because their homes didn’t encroach on the three-meter easement zone of Mahiga Creek.
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