In a bid to help the elderly pickers, Baguio Council to inquire on Irisan security policy
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BAGUIO CITY (June 12) — As the city council approves a measure on solid waste, city councilors questioned a provision of the 14-Point Security Policy being implemented by the contractor at the Irisan dump site in their desperate bid to intervene in behalf of the trash pickers.
Item 8 of the said security plan prohibits minors and elderly trash pickers from entering the dump site, depriving most of them of their livelihood sources. Only 18 to59 years old waste pickers shall be allowed at the dumpsite.
Most of the senior citizens affected by the ruling visited the council session anew to get the legislators’ support. Most of them said they get hog feeds from garbage.
Last week, the elderly trash pickers organized into a group they call Irisan Dump Site Pickers and Sorters, headed by Lope Leaño, submitted their appeal for the intervention of the city council.
Appearing before the council, City Environment and Parks Management Officer (CEPMO) Cordelia lacsamana and Nazita Bañez said equipment at the dump site would endanger both the too young and the elderly sorters. Bañez said three bulldozers and two back-hoes are now moving earth and garbage as a part of the P14 million closure program which would run for 120 days.
Bañez said the elderly could just ask other members of the household to get hog feeds to ensure their safety. To this the councilors invoked that there is no law barring senior citizens at garbage dump sites.
“They could be more able-bodied than we think they are,” invoked Councilor Galo Weygan.
The question on whether or not to allow sexagenarians inside the dump site got lost in the sea of arguments questioning the validity of the contract between the city mayor and the Asia Envirocons. (Please see another story in this issue of the Northern Dispatch.)
The query shifted to the Manila-based contractor, who one of the councilors deemed unable to take into consideration the people’s situation and livelihood.
“You are from Manila that you failed to understand the plight of the people here,” Councilor and Vice-mayor-elect Daniel Fariñas told Vince Camelon, the contractor’s representative.
Unable to get a concrete decision on their plight, the old men and women left the session hall half-hearted. One of them, a woman with a cane, even said it was her 100th birthday present to have been seated at the session hall gallery.
Another one claimed to have 30 pigs to feed and also walked out with a feeling of heaviness.
Last week, the council delayed the approval of the 10-year waste management plan to accommodate Weygan’s presentation of his adjunct proposal which spelled his counter-proposals to the plan which resulted from several consultations spearheaded by the City Ecological Solid Waste Management Board. The council this week referred the adjunct proposal to the said board.
City Social Welfare office will be in the session next week to clarify the issues on the youth and the elderly. # Lyn V. Ramo for NORDIS
