Gov’t adopts framework on resettlement of informal settlers

The Philippine government’s umbrella institution for housing and development offices has adopted the national resettlement policy framework (NRPF) for informal settlers in hazardous locations or those displaced by disasters, calamities or state-sponsored programs.

In its second council meeting last Dec. 14, the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) adopted the NRPF for informal settler families. Based on government estimates, there are 1.4 million such informal settler families across the country.

Organization of Socialized and Economic Housing Developers of the Philippines (OSHDP) president Marcelino Mendoza said he fully supported the adoption of the NRPF, especially the principles of involuntary and off-city resettlement as a last resort, and the identification of available lands and its mobilization for socialized housing, inventory of idle government lands and local government unit (LGU)-owned foreclosed properties.

In a statement, OSHDP said the framework would go a long way in addressing the country’s six million housing backlog.

OSHDP also commended the provision that resettlement site locations must be identified and implemented according to land use and development plans. Prior to the adoption of this framework, resettlement programs are “not generally reactive in nature.”

With this principle, the LGUs are seen becoming full partners in the planning, implementation and management of resettlement programs. The government, for its part, has committed to invest in and build the necessary administrative, social, financial and physical infrastructure for resettlement.

Mendoza said the framework would now be able to tie up the loose ends in the identification of responsibilities in the provision of resettlement housing between national housing agencies such as the National Housing Authority and the Housing and Land Use Regulatory Board, on one hand, and the LGUs on the local level.