Maragusan wins DSWD Bayani Ka Awards

Davao City – Maragusan town of Compostela Valley was adjudged Best MLGU in Participatory Governance while Person with Disability Rey Jaboneta also of Maragusan was named Best PWD Volunteer during the 1st DSWD Bayani Ka Awards held Friday at the Asian Institute of Management, Makati City.
Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Corazon Juliano-Soliman presented the awards.

The Bayani Ka Awards is a social marketing initiative of Kalahi-CIDSS designed to acknowledge the hard work of local, everyday heroes who put their own communities before their own selves. It also aims to develop a pool of champions to help in promoting the program.

The event was attended by partners from Millennium Challenge Corporation, Kalahi-CIDSS Champions, DSWD Regional Directors, members of Kalahi-CIDSS National Program Management Office, Kalahi-CIDSS regional program managers, and other national awardees from different regions.
Secretary Soliman in her message said Kalahi CIDSS is a program that fully engages the community in project implementation.

She also expressed her appreciation to the local government units and to the volunteers for their efforts to make community driven development (CDD) a successful approach to combat poverty.

“I am honored to tell the whole Philippines that Kalahi-CIDSS program is a reality that brought to life the democracy we Filipinos fought for,” Secretary Soliman added.

The nomination and validation in the field offices ran from September-November 2014. A total of 17 awards were conferred this year.
Kalahi-CIDSS is a poverty reduction program where decision-making resides in the community.  It is a flagship program of DSWD along with the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program and Sustainable Livelihood Program.

Sub-projects implemented through Kalahi-CIDSS cover basic social services [water systems, health stations], basic access infrastructure [foot bridges, access roads], common service facilities [irrigation systems], environmental protection and conservation [flood control systems], and skills training and capability building.

Grateful winners

Mayor Cesar C. Colina of Maragusan, Compostela Valley personally received the award.

“I am thankful to DSWD because the program helped reduce the insurgency in our area. The attention of the residents was diverted to the project implementation of Kalahi-CIDSS, rather than focusing on the conflict that exists in some areas of our municipality,” Mayor Colina conveyed.

Kalahi-CIDSS volunteer Rey Jaboneta, 42, of Barangay New Panay expressed his utmost gratitude for the recognition he received from DSWD.

Jaboneta, born with polio, shared his experience of being discriminated in his community. At a young age, fate pushed him to learn things the hard way. Through Kalahi-CIDSS, he was given the chance to be at the forefront of the program especially when he was elected as Barangay Sub-Project Management Committee (BSPMC) Chair.

“Let me reiterate my utmost gratefulness to DSWD for giving me this recognition that I will truly cherish for the rest of my life,” Jaboneta stressed.
Kalahi-CIDSS now covers a national scale of operations of the community driven development (CDD) approach, which was tried and proven effective in the past 11 years of implementation.

From 2014 to 2019, the program has a Php9.3 billion project cost nationwide targeting some 847 poorest municipalities. In Region XI, Kalahi-CIDSS will operate in 21 municipalities in 2015. DSWD/Julie Ace Brandon F. Ramos/ccd