Can informal settlers co-exist with the rich in the big city?.

Can informal settlers co-exist with the rich in the big city?
by Lila R. Shahani, RAPPLER.com
March 12, 2012

MANILA, Philippines – A different wind blowing in the post-Marcos years had already begun to bring radical change in government policy on housing for the urban poor.

In March of 1992, President Corazon Aquino signed RA 7279 (aka the Urban Development and Housing Act or Udha) – “to provide the underprivileged with decent housing at affordable cost, basic services and employment opportunities.”

In 1994, then President Fidel V Ramos signed the Comprehensive Shelter Finance Act (Cisfa), giving Udha muscle. (Ramos is this writer’s uncle.)

But Udha had not been fully implemented. Coordination between local government units, as well as national housing agencies, was not always done consistently.

At the time, national implementing agencies led by the National Housing Authority (NHA) and the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) became unpopular among urban poor groups and the NGOs supporting them.

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