It is typical to distant areas to have limited access to
basic services and to government aid. Help, not necessarily
the one the residents of these areas were expecting, would
usually arrive late, if at all. The establishment of the
Dap-Ayan Ti Barangay in Gonzaga, Cagayan, helped the community
members voice out their problems through a regular forum.
The local government would not have found out that
there were a lot of people with no jobs or with jobs that
do not make full use of their abilities had this program
not been instituted. To keep the program effective, weekly
meetings among the municipality’s 25 barangays were
held to serve as a venue for anyone to voice out their complaints
over the radio or with the community members involved. Anyone
and everyone who has access to the station and to the minutes
of the meetings would know the issues that have been discussed
and would also have the freedom and courage to voice out
their own problems, as they arise.
This information is then gathered and processed by
the local government. The group looks through the issues,
prioritized them, putting the most critical ones at the
top of the list, and think of programs or projects that
would address these.
This program has been going on since mid-1998 and
has not dimmed a bit. A lot of environment, cultural, social,
and economic problems have been addressed, as seen in the
influx of infrastructure projects, the protection of natural
resources, and the self-sufficiency of the communities.
Seeing the effectivity of this program, other municipalities
in Cagayan also adopted this idea and saw its rewards.
