The World Bank and the AIIB are co-financing this project, which aims to improve Metro Manila’s resilience to floods by upgrading water pumping infrastructure in rivers and reducing impediments to water flow. A key component of the project is “participatory housing and resettlement,” through a program called Oplan Likas, of approximately 2,500 households of informal settler families (11,500 people). In 2013, the Philippine government launched the Oplan Likas program to relocate about 104,000 informal settler families in Manila out of danger and high-risk areas, including waterways, in order to keep them safe from floods and to clear these areas for flood-control works. World Bank documents note that this program has “been subject to criticism, mostly for lack of consideration for adverse socioeconomic impacts on the affected households, such as loss of economic livelihood opportunities, lack of adequate access to basic services, and disruption of social networks.”
In past IFI-funded resettlement projects, people with disabilities have been almost entirely overlooked. People with disabilities have not been counted in the census of those who are displaced, accessibility is not considered in design of resettlement sites and housing, and people with disabilities’ unique needs are not considered during the process of resettlement. The result is compounded marginalization and exclusion for people with disabilities who are involuntarily resettled.
