CEBU City’s Badjao community will be relocated to a mangrove area in Barangay Inayawan this year, 2025, according to Mayor Raymond Alvin Garcia.
Garcia said he wants to complete the construction of new stilt houses for the Badjao community affected by the fire in Sitio Nava, Barangay Mambaling, last March 2.
In a press conference on Monday, March 24, Garcia presented design samples of the proposed housing plan prepared by the City Planning and Development Office.
The mangrove area is located at the back of the South Road Properties (SRP) and across the Inayawan landfill.
The proposed resettlement site with an area of 33.88 hectares will traverse the proposed Gabuya Street extension all the way to the SRP.
Stilt houses
The design features hexagonal-shaped clustered housing units and a common area with a vacuum sewer system of at least 20 square meters and a sewerage treatment area of at least 250 square meters.
Garcia said funds for the proposed 322 housing units will come from the City’s disaster risk reduction and management budget and possibly the National Housing Authority (NHA) under the agency’s ‘Pambansang Pabahay’ program.
A group of Malaysian investors has also offered to finance the project. However, specific details on the investment model remain unclear, said Garcia.
Garcia said the Malaysian group and the Cebu City Government could collaborate under a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) or the project could simply be a donation to the City of Cebu as an act of goodwill.
Under the PPP, the plan could involve 100 housing units funded by the Cebu City Government and 300 units from the Malaysian group.
“However, this will depend on our discussions with them as the cost should not be too high since the houses will be built using lightweight materials,” the mayor said.
The resettlement area would likely retain the stilt housing style, akin to the Badjaos’ traditional way of life as sea gypsies, but it will be placed in a safer area with mangrove protection, Garcia said.
Garcia said the plan was inspired with the NHA’s “Pambansang Pabahay” program in Zamboanga and Basilan as a possible model for Cebu City’s initiative.
The design also ensures a sustainable and culturally sensitive approach to relocation, he added.
Garcia said the Division for the Welfare of the Urban Poor (DWUP) has already profiled the beneficiaries of the housing project. / EHP