Bukidnon – More than 1,000 indigenous peoples from the Talaandig tribe in the municipality of Lantapan in this province are going to receive livelihood assistance provided through the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP) of the Department of Social Welfare and Development.

The said assistance is in line with the Modified Conditional Cash Transfer for Indigenous Peoples (MCCT-IP) who are in Geographically Isolated and Disadvantaged Areas (GIDA).

The MCCT-IP is a special program of the department that focuses mainly in the provision of support services to the indigenous peoples.

For region 10, DSWD serves 18,901 MCCT-IP beneficiaries.

“For a long time we are being neglected and even mistreated sometimes by the general public, and the government who supposed to protect us was not there”, elders of the Talaandig tribe say. “It almost seemed like our children are left behind in terms of education and other basic services, we have dreams for them too”, they added. “We are just glad that we are now going to receive livelihood assistance from DSWD”.

As a celebration of peace and partnership, the tribe offered their rituals and prayers to the whole group. This signifies positivity among the implementers and even more a responsibility to work harder to support these people. As the DSWD secretary Corazon “Dinky” Juliano-Soliman says, “No one should be left behind”.

In Mindanao there are a total of 18 indigenous groups collectively known as “Lumad” with a population of about 60% of the overall population of IPs in the Philippines as disclosed by the National Commission on Indigenous People.

The Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP) will provide all the technical assistance in the preparation and implementation of this MCCT-IP Support Services Program, which will commence this month.

Written by Jamila M. Taha, DSWD