MORE than 1,900 completed shelters were turned over by the Philippine Red Cross (PRC) for the affected families of Supertyphoon Yolanda (international code name Haiyan) on Bantayan Island in Cebu on May 1.
The shelter project in Bantayan Island, particularly in the towns of Madridejos and Bantayan, were done by the PRC, in partnership with German Red Cross, and was done under PRC’s Typhoon Haiyan Recovery Program.
More than 500 houses are still to be built in Bantayan Island for those who lost their homes to Yolanda in November 2013.
“Bantayan Island was one of the worst-hit islands in the province of Cebu when typhoon Yolanda came. The left the island completely isolated in its wake, left several dead and thousands homeless,” PRC Chairman Richard J. Gordon said.
Yolanda made its fourth landfall on Bantayan Island in Cebu, which left about 30 percent of the island’s residents completely without homes, while 90 percent of the houses that were left standing had the roofs torn off.
“With this housing project for the residents of Bantayan Island, the PRC and German Red Cross were able to provide not just a place to live for the families that have been affected by Yolanda, but more important, we were able to give them back their dignity and helped them start anew after their horrifying ordeal,” Gordon added.
For the whole province of Cebu, PRC, in partnership with other national societies in the Red Cross Movement and some private donors, have already built a total of 7,772 houses as of April 22. More than 600 houses are still to be built to complete the target number of houses for identified shelter beneficiaries in the province.
As of date, a total of 73,361 houses have already been built by the Red Cross and partners in nine provinces that have been severely affected by Yolanda. The nine provinces are Aklan, Antique, Capiz, Cebu, Iloilo, Leyte, Palawan, Eastern Samar and Western Samar.