Death toll in Lanao refugee centers hits 54

PIKIT, North Cotabato — Sixteen more evacuees, mostly children, have died of various diseases contracted in different relief sites set up for residents affected by clashes between the military and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels.

Rev. Bert Layson, a parish priest spearheading the relief work for the evacuees, said yesterday the latest fatalities succumbed to pneumonia, dysentery or severe malnutrition, bringing the death toll to 54 since March.

"The recent torrential rains in Pikit aggravated the deplorable situation at the evacuation camps," Layson said.

Heavy rains last week flooded more than a dozen relief sites here and in nearby Pagalungan, Maguindanao.

The downpours swelled the Rio Grande de Mindanao, which traverses Pikit and Pagalungan, flooding farmlands along its banks and destroying an estimated P15 million worth of rice and corn crops.

The torrential rains also prevented local officials from allowing the evacuees to return to the villages they were forced to flee from because of intermittent clashes since the military’s February offensive against the Buliok complex, a former MILF stronghold.

Since March, local officials, led by Pikit Mayor Farida Malingco, non-government organizations and the military facilitated the return of some 2,000 evacuees to their homes but there are still around 4,000 evacuees who cannot go home because of MILF attacks.

The military said they have deployed more troops to prevent MILF rebels from staging further "retaliatory attacks."

Last Friday, MILF rebels torched down 20 houses in a farming community in Kabasalan area near Pikit, a few kilometers away from the Buliok Complex.

Muslim Army officers and soldiers who are now deployed in the surroundings of the Buliok Complex have been tasked to embark on confidence-building measures with local communities to complement government efforts of allow evacuees to return home.

Social Welfare Secretary Corazon Soliman said thousands of the evacuees from the Lanao provinces fled to government evacuation centers after fleeing their villages due to clashes in Maigo, Lanao del Norte on April 24.

Soliman reported that about 4,096 families, or 17,663 individuals, are now in the evacuation sites and are continually provided with food, clothing and other relief items.

She said most of the refugees came from clusters of villages from at least 13 towns of Lanao del Norte and Lanao del Sur.

"The number has even reduced because some of the civilians, hundreds of them, started to return to their homes after ensuring the rebels had already been driven out," Soliman said.

On the other hand, Armed Forces Southern Command (Southcom) chief Maj. Gen. Roy Kyamko assured civilians are being moved out of harm’s way in the military’s continuing "selective attacks" against the MILF.

"The operation is really selective, unlike in the rebels attacks where they fired on civilians indiscriminately," Kyamko said. – With Roel Pareño