Lito Ruiz Sets Up a Foundation For Lapu-Lapu City Residents

Dec. 18, 2008 - PRLog -- Lito Ruiz Sets Up a Foundation For Lapu-Lapu City Residents

Philippine DILG Undersecretary Lito Ruiz has announced plans to create a charitable foundation to help residents of Lapu-Lapu City in the island province of Cebu. The Lito Ruiz Charitable Foundation is a non-profit corporation that will focus on low-cost projects with the aim of streamlining both the educational and bureaucratic levels of the city so that its residents can take advantage of the latest IT technologies as well as having a fast track to the lucrative overseas employment market for Filipino workers.

He said that this new foundation will initially concentrate on two main areas: the first will create a low cost IT network at the barangay level and the second project is designed to join forces with the Philippine DOLE (Department of Labor and Employment) in order to facilitate a one-stop solution for educational certification and would then coordinate with certified overseas recruiters to provide locals immediate employment for jobs overseas. In addition, special scholarship funds will be set up for orphans of overseas contract workers, military personnel, police and firemen who died in the line of duty while serving the city.

Ruiz said that the foundation’s mission statement will focus on empowerment, education and information. “I firmly believe that Filipinos can excel at anything they do,” he said. “What the local government in the Philippines needs to do is provide the right tools so that our local citizens can achieve their dreams and this foundation will do just that.”

Being a native of Cebu, Ruiz suggests that once the foundation’s projects have come to fruition then these same projects can serve as a model for the rest of the country. “Once we can show the success of these low-cost projects in Lapu-Lapu City, we can extend the reach of the foundation so as to encompass the entire Philippines and, who knows, perhaps even for the rest of the developing world,” Ruiz said.