ILOILO City – The Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) has temporarily suspended road clearing operations.
For now, local officials, including those of barangay councils, must focus on addressing the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, said Regional Director Ariel Iglesia.
Road clearing may resume once the current health threat eases, he said.
President Rodrigo Duterte declared a state of public health emergency on March 9 due to COVID-19.
Iglesia said local officials – provincial, city, municipal, and barangay – have become frontliners in the government’s effort to contain the spread of COVID-19.
They supervise checkpoint and distribute home quarantine passes and assistance / relief goods to people economically displaced by quarantine, he noted.
Just this Feb. 16, DILG gave local officials, including barangay leaders, 75 days or until April 30 to clear roads, including the local ones.
In DILG Memorandum Circular 2020-027, Secretary Eduardo Año spelled out the tasks specifically of barangay officials:
* all punong barangays shall be in charge of the conduct of road clearing operations in barangay roads and minor public-use streets within their jurisdictions, as well as the maintenance of other local roads turned over by the city or municipal government
* further, they shall harmonize barangay ordinances with this directive, collaborate and coordinate with the mayor in regards to road clearing
* undertake information dissemination campaigns in their respective barangays
* reports on barangay compliance shall be submitted monthly to the DILG
The memo also tasked provincial governors to do the following:
* ensure the compliance of city and municipal mayors in their respective provinces
* ensure that provincial issuances and ordinances are in harmony with the DILG memo
* spearheaded clearing operation in all provincial roads and interface with mayors to discuss the implementation of the DILG memo and formulation of strategies for the improved and continuous conduct of road clearing operation in local government units/PN
