PUGO, La Union – Concerned residents of this fifth-class municipality continue to criticize the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Region I for alleged questionable acts and evident bias in the conduct of payouts under the agency’s Assistance to Individuals in Crisis Situation (AICS) in favor of certain political figures in the province’s second district.
Sources, who requested anonymity for personal and security reasons, questioned the decision of DSWD Region I personnel who were in charge for the payout done in barangay Cares last March 4, 2025 first, for preparing a list of recipients for the AICS assistance that included some municipal councilors, barangay officials, tanods, barangay health workers, child development workers, among others, and secondly, when learning that they will be made accountable for their biased list, allegedly allowed outright replacements of the original identified recipient with certain individuals who were reportedly not part of the original list.
The sources claimed that individuals whose names were in the original list of beneficiaries reportedly opted to identify their supposed replacements upon learning that complaints are being prepared against them considering their status as public officers who are not supposed to be beneficiaries of the program in the first place.
Further, local officials were also disappointed over the alleged failure of DSWD Region I officers to provide a definite answer on their queries relative to whether or not incumbent municipal councilors or barangay officials are qualified to be recipients of the AICS funds, saying that the matter will surely be brought to the attention of higher authorities for the conduct of an in-depth investigation on the questionable distribution of assistance in the province’s second district over the past several months.
The sources pointed out that people availing of the AICs are required to present various documents to qualify them to such aid, but in the case of the town’s municipal and barangay officials who are reportedly allied with an incumbent official in the province’s second district, their inclusion as among the beneficiaries had been reportedly railroaded to advance the personal and political interest of the politician’s niece who is aspiring for an elected position in the municipality.
According to the sources, even those people who were present in the distribution of payouts as spectators were given the financial assistance after the concerned municipal and barangay officials who were listed did not appear because they could not in conscience be receiving public funds that they know are not intended for them.
The sources called on the DSWD central office to look into the questionable practice of the DSWD Region I in the distribution of the payouts so that appropriate measures can be instituted to prevent the government’s programs from being unjustly used by some politicians to advance their personal and political interests at the expense of taxpayer’s money, as shown by persons who want to lord it over in the province’s second district.
The list of beneficiaries was allegedly prepared by the DSWD Region I in coordination with the Office of La Union 2nd District Rep. Dante Garcia. By Dexter A. See
