Yt Framework

Councilor Benjamin Guingona yesterday said that business establishments in Zamboanga City specifically drugstores are now cooperating and adhering to the senior citizens law that provides a 20-percent discount on its products.

The councilor relayed the information during the program dubbed “Citywide Consultative Evaluation Conference” held at the Garden Orchid Hotel attended by over a thousand members of the Federation of Senior Citizens Association of the Philippines led by their president Corazon Herico.

Guingona said the gathering of the elderly is an annual affair to thresh out and evaluate the programs and projects of the association belonging to the different chapters of the seven districts in the city.

The councilor, who chairs the Committee on Elderly and the Disadvantaged in the City Council, also explained that the amended Senior Citizens Act No. 9994 is excellent and upright since it has increased the benefits of the older individuals not only in the city but the entire country as well.

“We thank the national government for amending the law on the elderly which is now more noble and dignified because it really helps the senior citizens cope up with the present realities,” Guingona said.

Mayor Celso Lobregat, who was also present in the affair, handed over P10,000 to officials of the elderly to help them in the affair.

The mayor has been supportive of the programs of the senior citizens in the city.

The city government had appropriated millions of pesos to help fund the projects of the older people to include the senior citizens ward at the Zamboanga City Medical Center, the Senior Citizens building in Barangay Boalan and many others.

Also present in the gathering are Councilor Luis Biel III, Councilor Lilia Nuno, City Social Welfare Officer Francisco Barredo and Congresswoman Isabelle Climaco Salazar.

By Nonong santiago