Manila  - Malinao village head Romy Marcelo looked worried as volunteers handed out the last bag of food to desperate residents in Manila's suburban city of Pasig.

Those who failed to get a pack left quietly, crestfallen as they faced another wet night with no food.

It has been four days since tropical storm Ketsana caused the worst flooding in decades in Manila and nearby provinces, and still many villages, including Malinao, remain under water.

"I don't know what else to tell them," Marcelo said. "We have no more food items to distribute. We don't know when we will get more supplies."

He said the village had already depleted its disaster fund and could no longer give out food packs that usually contain 2 kilograms of rice, one small can of sardines and one pack of instant noodles.

Marcelo said Malinao has not received help from the city or national government since the tragedy struck on Saturday, killing more than 240 people and affecting nearly 2 million people across the country.

"I hope they will not forget us," he said.

Like Malinao, many areas affected by the devastating floods were calling for urgent assistance as an overwhelmed national government struggles to cope with the disaster.

"We need help now," said Jaime Medina, mayor of Pateros City, one of the poorest municipalities in metropolitan Manila.

"We may not have many dead here, but our people are going hungry," he said in a plea broadcast on local radio.

Rosalia Fruto, a vendor, said her house in Raymundo village in Pasig City was still covered in sludge and her family was forced to stay in an evacuation centre, but she had to return to work to be able to get by.

The mother of four was not impressed at all that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and her cabinet members pledged to donate two months of their salaries - worth 5.65 million pesos (120,000 dollars) in total - to the relief effort.

"This government has no concern for the poor like us," said Fruto, who brought her 3-year-old daughter with her in a plastic washbasin, selling chicken meat a few metres away from the still-flooded Pasig City Hall.

Felisa Ramos, a mother of six, said her youngest child already caught a fever in the cramped evacuation centre that has been their home since Saturday.

"I fear that more people will get sick and everyone will fall ill," she said. "We are staying at a village hall and we are packed like sardines in there."

Defence Secretary Gilberto Teodoro, who heads the National Disaster Coordinating Council, appealed for more understanding as he vowed to ensure that aid would reach more areas soon.

"We feel their anger and pain but it is physically impossible to reach each and everyone with the conditions that we face," he said.

Amid mounting criticism, Arroyo opened the sprawling Malacanang presidential palace to provide shelter for homeless victims.

"If required, our employees will yield their work stations to provide more space for our displaced countrymen," she said.

Her daughter also staffed a distribution centre for relief goods at the palace.

Arroyo said the government was trying its best to respond to what she described as a "once-in-a-lifetime emergency" and that people just misunderstood the administration's disaster response.

She said the rains on Saturday at the height of tropical storm Ketsana were more than double the amount brought about by hurricane Katrina that devastated New Orleans in 2005.

"At any time, our preparations against unforeseeable obligations to our people can never be perfect," she said, offering little assurance to thousands still waiting for help. (dpa)