A new type of homeless street people has emerged in Metro Manila as urban poor communities are demolished and jobs hard to find, a visiting Japanese social scientist and researcher said.

This is a new phenomenon, the result of globalization and a crisis of capitalism, Hideo Aoki, director of Institute on Social Theory and Dynamics based in Hiroshima City, Japan, told ucanews.com yesterday.

He estimates that there are “more than 100,000” homeless people living in and around Metro Manila.

The Catholic Church can play a major role in alleviating their plight, he said.

Aoki is spending 10 days in the Philippines capital region to update his research on Metro Manila’s homeless for a book he will publish in Japan later this year.

Squatters, while strictly “homeless,” tend to move to the suburbs while the “new homeless” tend to converge on Manila in increasing numbers number, he said.

“I know some priests who support squatters but they should extend support to homeless people, too,” he explained.

“Without NGOs, street children would not survive. Metro Manila is the best place for street people. There are many supermarkets, restaurants and small jobs. That’s why many migrate from the provinces,” Aoki said.

He presented his study to the Jesuit-run Ateneo de Manila University’s John J. Carroll Institute on Church and Social Issues (ICSI) where he is a research fellow.

Aoki identified two ways the Church can support homeless people. Catholic groups can give homeless people food and materials and “reason to hope and dream through enlightenment,” the sociologist said.

Aoki spent three years writing his 2007 research study about street homeless in Metro Manila.

He has been studying the urban poor and squatter problem in general since he stayed for one year in Manila with his family 25 years ago.

He has studied the plight of the poor in several countries but says the Philippines presents specific challenges.

“It is very difficult to study homelessness in Manila because there are no books, no papers, no information from academe, government, journalistic reports. I started from zero.

“I walked, got many interviews, got information, then constructed an image of homelessness,” he said.

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