Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim yesterday continued providing assistance to the evacuees who either stayed at the evacuation centers or have left to start rebuilding or cleaning up their homes.       
The mayor also continued monitoring yesterday the evacuees’ condition and the areas hardest hit by floods recently, accompanied by chief of staff and media bureau director Ric de Guzman, social welfare chief Jay de la Fuente, city security force chief (ret.) Maj. Nick Amparo, consultant Tony Abad and  (ret.) Col. Caloy Baltazar, chief of the Department of Public Services.
The same officials joined the mayor as he proceeded to the Manuel  Roxas High School in Paco and the Moises Salvador Elementary School in Sampaloc to provide cash assistance and gift packs to the evacuees who remained there.
De la Fuente reported  nearly all the evacuees who were displaced by the recent heavy floods brought about by monsoon rains have gone back to their homes.
De la Fuente said about 80 percent of the schools which were used as temporary evacuation centers had been cleared of evacuees.
Just the same, De la Fuente added, Lim has standing orders to continue providing all possible assistance to the affected residents, whether or not they have remained at evacuation centers or have settled back in their respective homes.
Meanwhile, Lim said floodwaters have subsided in almost all of Manila, even as City Engineer Armand Andres  reported that as of 10:30 p.m. Thursday, the Lagusnilad Underpass near city hall had been cleared of the 16-foot high waters that filled it up during the continuous rains.
Andres said on mayor’s orders, clean-up operations were conducted in the vicinity of city hall and its underpass so that they have returned to normalcy as early as the other day.
Floodwaters in the Recto Underpass, meanwhile, were still being pumped out at press time and, according to Andres, it will take about two or three more days before the underpass is finally cleared and becomes passable again.