BAHAYNIHAN: Cops provide shelter, give hope to the poor amid pandemic

By Jennifer P. Rendon

 

At the onset of the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) in Western Visayas, the Police Regional Office (PRO)-6 kicked off a project that provides food assistance to the region’s poorest of the poor.

Dubbed “Adopt-a-Family Program: Kapwa ko, Sagot ko,” it benefited thousands of families in Western Visayas after it was rolled out from March 31 to April 16.

Different police units and offices gave assorted grocery packs to poor families to help them get by the crisis even just for a week.

It was through this activity that the Capiz Police Provincial Office and the Roxas City Police Station learned the plight of Asucena de Juan, a 76-year-old woman who lived by herself in a shanty at Barangay Sibaguan, Roxas City, Capiz.

Police Lieutenant Colonel Ricardo Jomuad, Roxas City police chief, said Lola Asucena’s situation was beyond heart-wrenching.

Her house was destroyed when Typhoon Ursula pummeled the region in Christmas of 2019.

The case of Lola Asucena paved the way for CPPO’s BAHAYNIHAN or the “Bahay at Kabuhayan Nila Handog Namin.”

Police Colonel Julio Gustilo said they initiated the project with the aim of helping the homeless and poorest families in Capiz affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We realized that how can an elderly person enjoy the food that we provide if she could barely shield herself from the wind, rain, or scorching heat? This is where the Bahaynihan project was born,” Gustilo said.

 

HOME SWEET HOME

On April 8, 2020, the Capiz police helped Lola Asucena by providing her with food allowance.

Members of the Roxas City Police Station pooled their money and went back to the elderly woman a week later.

Sympathy and help poured in when netizens saw Lola Asucena’s plight.

Through Facebook, lawyer Albert Gregory Potato and Saya Chen KTV Music Lounge learned of her predicament. They provided help in giving her a decent roof to live under.

By April 23, with the help of the village officials and residents of Barangay Sibaguan, Lola Asucena’s house was completed.

“Our plan was to build 17 houses of the province’s poorest of the poor. We targeted that at least one police station will have one beneficiary,” Gustilo said.

But as of July 17, CPPO already initiated 32 Bahaynihan projects – 25 are already done and 7 are up for completion.

“Right now, the project has become an emerging best practice of Capiz PPO since other city and municipal police stations, with the help of benevolent individuals and groups, have started to replicate Bahaynihan,” Gustilo said.

 

AWARD

Gustilo was recently cited for the command’s “good deed” because of their Bahaynihan initiative.

No less than PNP chief General Archie Francisco Gamboa presented him the Medalya ng Kasanayan in recognition of the CPPO’s “efforts and initiatives to uplift the lives and living condition of our less fortunate brothers and sisters.”

The Capiz police chief believed that the project they started would go a long way since there are a lot of people who believed that “a sheltered, protected and empowered family can help us maintain a crime-less locality.”