Vitas tenants dialogue with NHA
VP Jejomar C. Binay and NHA General Manager Atty. Chito Cruz listen to Vitas tenants as they raise their issues and concerns.
"We must ensure the welfare and safety of the residents in Vitas Tenement (also known as Diosdado Macapagal Tenement) considering that the housing project is already in bad shape. In the light of the recent earthquake in Japan, we must relocate the residents to soundly- constructed housing projects."
This was the pronouncement made clear by Vice-President and Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) Chairman Jejomar C. Binay in a dialogue last March 24, 2011, with residents of Barangay 99, Zone 8, District I, in Vitas, Tondo, Manila.
The Vitas Tenement was declared by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to be unsafe to its tenants, high risk, ruinous and dangerous. As of July 30, 2010, the building was condemned per assessment report of the Task Force on Building and Bridge Inspection composed of structural engineers from the DPWH- Bureau of Design.
In another dialogue held at the National Housing Authority office in Quezon City last April 6, 2011, NHA General Manager Atty. Chito M. Cruz along with Assistant General Manager Froilan R. Kampitan, NHA West – Sector Project Officers, Local-Inter-Agency Committee (LIAC) members, Local Government Unit (LGU) officers explained with the Vitas tenants the issues, hazards and concerns for their immediate transfer and relocation of families to safe, livable resettlement projects of the government where they will have security of tenure and socio-economic opportunities.
They also offered various interventions, safety measures and options to look into the welfare of the Vitas tenants prior to the expiration of one- month notice / deadline of relocation, mandated under Republic Act 7279, on April 27, 2011.
"NHA is very much ready to accept residents to the relocation project, where they will be accorded sound and safe living condition. We want to save them from imminent danger," Atty. Cruz stated.