Here in Payatas, the people work 12-18 hours per day. It is not because they are selfish and want to be rich. It is because they don’t want their families to starve to death. When they are sick and can’t work, they don’t eat and sickness is frequent in this rotten, stinking place where it is the depot for all Manila’s garbage.

Father’s and mother’s work together as well as their children. Little children no higher than your waistline roam the streets with sacks in their hands looking for recyclables they might find. Going home only when it gets dark, their dirt blackened bodies blending in with the twilight sky.

In this community, many will get no education, will receive no medical care, and will die well before the national average in a first world Country.
Even with all this pain and suffering, there are no complaints. They continue to work at the tons of garbage as ants going back and forth until they have sorted through the throw offs of society to find some treasure of their own. There treasure sometimes only amounts to being able to buy a small amount of rice for their families.

As I said, even with all this they have continued on without complaint, until now.
The wonderful and beneficial Government which oversees all and looks out for the oppressed (in case you can not tell, this is sarcasm) has decided to build homes for the “poor” right here in Payatas.
“Wow”, you say, what a great Mayor we have. Let’s see if that is true. To build the homes they need to tear down the meager shacks of those who have been working the Governments waste management for free and for many years.
These people are offered a pittance to move. (about 10,000 pesos). $240 U.S.

Looking for salvation

Rents in the area are about p1500 per month so that money would quickly disappear and because these people do not make enough on their own to pay that rent, they would quickly be on the street again.

The Government houses cost p2,500 per month. This is middle and upper class range and is not for anyone anywhere near being poor.

The Government should be subsidizing new homes for these people as they do the Governments work here in Payatas, The thing is, here in Payatas, there is no shortage of poor people and so you can indiscriminately rip down their houses and ship them off and it doesn’t make a dent in the labor force.
This is the Government.
If I was able to vote this election, I would vote against any sitting politician as none of them are worth anything to the people of Payatas.
Perhaps the shut down of the garbage dump would wake some people up.

People, not one TV, radio station or newspaper found this interesting enough to tell the story. Sounds like the Government owns the media also.