BACOLOD City – An elderly woman died while waiting to get her cash aid from the government’s Social Amelioration Program (SAP) in in Barangay Villamonte in this city.
Police identified the fatality as 87-year-old Aurelia Magbanua.
According to Villamonte village chief Rommel Flores, Magbanua was sitting on a chair inside the barangay gymnasium, waiting for his turn to receive her SAP benefit when she suddenly collapsed around 9 a.m. on July 23.
Magbanua was rushed to a private hospital in this city where she was declared “dead on arrival.”
Flores said they are not encouraging elderly grantees and persons with disabilities to personally claim their financial assistance in the venue as it was the job of barangay officials to deliver the grant in their houses.
Magbanua’s daughter Melanie Regis – the one who accompanied her to the gym – said they discouraged their mother from personally claiming her second tranche of financial aid since the weather was hot that day but the former insisted.
An 84-year-old man also died while waiting to claim his financial aid in Barangay Tangub last May./PN
