House bill protecting senior citizens from abuses gets Lapu-Lapu councilor’s support
A senior citizen in Lapu-Lapu City gets the city’s financial assistance in this 2019 photo. | CDN Digital File Photo (Futch Anthony Inso)
LAPU-LAPU CITY, Philippines — A Lapu-Lapu City councilor has expressed her support for the House bill which protects senior citizens from different kinds of abuses, especially from their relatives.
House Bill 7030 or the proposed “Anti-Elder Abuse Act” aims to protect senior citizens from violence. The proposed bill, which defines elder abuse and prescribed penalties for offenders, was still pending in Congress.
House bill 7030 backed
“Kita sa pagkakaron, atong gi-duso ang resolution endorsing the anti-elderly abuse sa Congress kay duna ta’y nakit-ang nga panghitabo dinhi sa atoa diin ang mga senior citizens pod gi-abuse sa ilang mga anak,” Councilor Annabeth Cuizon, chairperson of the committee on social services of the Lapu-Lapu City Council.
Cuizon said that among the abuses that senior citizens were currently experiencing included the non-giving of financial and medical support, and abandonment from their children.
Abuses against senior citizens
“Ang abuso nga pinaagi sa pinansyal kanang dili tagaan ug sustento or gi-abandon ba sila, paagi man na nga abuso. Dili na gani sila tungahon sa ilang anak, pasagdaan na lang unya nangasakit na,” she said.
(The abuse through financial assistance where they will no longer give assistance or they will abandon them, that is still a form of abuse. When a child will no longer visit or would not take care of them anymore and they will get sick.)
She added that there were even instances where the city would shoulder the burial of a senior citizen because they were abandoned by their kids.
Close family ties waning?
Cuizon said that she felt that the culture of close family ties among Filipinos was already slowly diminishing or forgotten.
“Di ba as a Filipino ang atong family ties. Close man gyud kaayo ta. Pero duna gyuy instances nga ang mga ginikanan karon gipangbiyaan,” she said.
(Is it not as a Filipino, we have our family ties. We are really close. But there are instances where the parents are abandoned by their children.
On June 14, the Lapu-Lapu City Council passed a resolution urging Congress for the approval of the proposed bill.
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