MATI, DAVAO ORIENTAL — Local chief executives have to understand the relevance of social development concerns especially regarding children, Davao Oriental Governor Corazon Malanyaon said.
Malanyaon pointed out that social concerns tend to be the least concern of some local government officials who usually need to be informed of a particular social issue to bring their attention into it.
“Ang nakikita ko na ang concerns na ito ay kailangan talagang maintindihan ng chief executives. (What I see in these concerns is that they have to be understood by the chief executives.)” She said in her talk with members of the Regional Inter-agency Monitoring Task Force which looked into the functionality of the provincial council for the Protection of Children.
No matter how good a program may be and how good implementers are, grassroots officials would take a hard time embracing the relevance of such program if it is least understood, Malanyaon said.
She cited as specific instance the program implementation of Early Childhood Care and Development (ECCD) whish she said, had created misconceptions especially at the municipal and barangay levels.
She said she has made it a point to save the program implementation and has popularized it as “Bright Child” which actually is referred to as the brand name of ECCD, a program that seeks to deliver holistic development of children.
Initially, she is giving focus on addressing the malnutrition problem in the province and that she is calling attention of mayors whose towns have been found to have high cases of children of below normal weights.
Malanyaon admitted that so much is still needed to be done in her province to advance children’s rights and that she wanted the monitoring team to give her feedback of findings as to how Davao Oriental fared in terms of child protection. (PIA XI)
social development, Youth & Children
