KIDAPAWAN CITY (MindaNews / 25 May) – At least 109 beneficiaries of the government’s Social Amelioration Program (SAP) in Soccsksargen (Region 12) who allegedly received multiple cash incentives would be charged with estafa and perjury.
Dennis Domingo, information officer of the Department of Social Welfare and Development – Region 12 (DSWD-12), said the unscrupulous individuals will be sued for violating provisions of Republic Act 11469 or the Bayanihan to Heal as One Act, the national government’s response to fight the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
Domingo said they discovered two types of schemes that SAP beneficiaries allegedly committed to deceive the government.
He said the first type include those who received the SAP assistance of P5,000 cash while also receiving their cash benefits under the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps).
Also, there were those who also received the P5,000 SAP incentive and at the same time took the cash assistance from the Tulong Pangkabuhayan Alang sa mga Disadvantaged Workers (TUPAD) of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), Domingo said.
For the second type, Domingo said these were SAP beneficiaries who were able to claim the P5,000 assistance twice.
Most of these SAP beneficiaries came from the towns of Aleosan, Pigcawayan, and Banisilan in North Cotabato and Bagumbayan in Sultan Kudarat, a report from DSWD-12 showed.
Domingo said these unscrupulous individuals were discovered through a mobile application that can detect faces.
“Every individual who received the P5,000 SAP cash was photographed. To check whether such face also received incentives other than SAP, we submitted the image to a mobile application. The application was really effective that was why we were able to detect violators,” Domingo said. (Malu Cadelina Manar / MindaNews)
