Marawi reconstruction at 65% complete, task force official says
MANILA, Philippines — An official on Tuesday said the rebuilding of Marawi has reached 65% completion, four years since the siege and months before the government's target by end of the year.
Groups from Mindanao over the weekend pressed the Duterte administration to fast-track reconstruction in the war-torn city, saying promises have yet to be fulfilled and many who were displaced have not returned home.
Over a Laging Handa briefing, Housing Secretary Eduardo del Rosario sought to assure that they remain on track to finish efforts by December 2021.
"We have to take in the methodology and understand that this cannot be done in an instant, said the housing secretary who also heads the Task Force Bangon Marawi, in Filipino.
Del Rosario said it took them nearly a year for early intervention activities or tending to the needs of those who were forced out of their homes. Some 370,000 had been displaced from the siege.
Clearing debris from the war, and removing bombs from ground zero stretched to a year and four months, he added, as he said too that those calling for quicker rehabilitation as going "off tangent."
"I will favor what legitimate organizations say that what they have in heart and mind is Marawi City's welfare," Del Rosario continued in Filipino. "But the other group of civil society organizations, all they do is criticize yet they don't do anything to help the rehabilitation on the ground."
Despite public infrastructure projects at 65%, a report by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism showed that many residents have not yet secured building permits, while others had no funds.
The siege in Marawi by members of the Islamic State-inspired Maute took four months. Estimate figures on deaths are at 114 civilians, 270 unidentified individuals, 168 government troops and 924 from the rebel group.
President Rodrigo Duterte placed the entire Mindanao under martial law on May 23, 2017. The said proclamation was extended and lasted for two years and seven months, or until end-2019.
Vice President Leni Robredo releases a statement a year after the siege in Marawi. She says that even though the battle has ended, the fight to bring back to normal the lives and livelihood of Marawi residents continues.
"Marami pa ring pamilya ang walang permanenteng bahay at maayos na hanapbuhay. Maraming mga mamamayan ang nangangailangan pa rin ng ayuda," she says.
"Sinimulan na ng pamahalaan ang proseso ng rehabilitasyon. Nakiisa ang ating opisina rito sa pagtayo ng Angat Buhay Village sa Barangay Sagongsongan, sa Marawi, na magsisilbing kabahagi ng mga transitory shelter para sa mga nawalan ng tahanan sa pinakanasalantang bahagi ng Marawi. Mahalaga ang mga pagkilos na ito, at marami pang kailangang gawin para makabangon nang tuluyan muli ang Marawi."
Bahagi nito ang pagkilala na maliban sa mga gusaling nagiba at buhay na nasira, kailangang pangalagaan ang boses ng mga taga-Marawi sa pagsasagawa ng rehabilitasyon. Ang tinig na pinakamahalagang mapakinggan ay galing sa mga pamayanan na naapektuhan ng digmaan.
Marawi Reconstruction Conflict Watch, a partner of International Alert Philippines, thanks Sen. Ronald Dela Rosa for his reassurance that government has not forgotten the people of Marawi City, the site of intense fighting in 2017 between government forces and an ISIS-inspired terrorist group.
"We invite him to stand shoulder to shoulder with us in pushing for the urgent passage of the Marawi Compensation Bill. For us, the internally displaced peoples of Marawi, just compensation serves as our last hope to be able to rebuild our lives," MRCW also says.
Three years since its liberation, Vice Leni Robredo renews the call for a more urgent approach to the rehabilitation of war-torn Marawi.
The vice president also calls for the government's commitment to the rebuilding of a more peaceful and prosperous city.
"Liberation entails much more than silencing the gunfire," Robredo says.
Sen. Risa Hontiveros joins calls to highlight the plight of displaced residents of Marawi City more than three years after the siege that destroyed a large part of the capital of Lanao del Sur.
"The bloody and violent siege that took place in Marawi is still alive in the displacement of our sisters and brothers three years later, today. That is 1,095 days of worsening poverty and violence that they have suffered because we still have not made their pain a priority," she says in a statement Sunday.
She says the pandemic makes the displacement of Marawi resdients even more painful as they wait for reconstruction in the city.
"Dahil habang tayo ay nakakulong sa ating mga tahanan, karamihan sa kanila ay wala pa ring mauuwian (While we are confined to our homes, most of them still have no homes at all). Washing hands, social distancing, staying healthy and earning income despite everything are especially heavy when you have not even been given the opportunity to properly recover economically, socially and psychologically, from the trauma and pain of a bloody war."
The Liberal Party says Marawi residents should return to their homes three years after the bloody Marawi siege, also the eve of the Muslim celebration of the end of Ramadan, or Eid’l Fitr.
“Kasama kami sa ating mga kapatid na Muslim sa pagdiriwang ng Eid'l Fitr,” says Liberal Party president Sen. Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan.
“Kakaiba ang pagdiriwang ngayong taon, may lockdown at paghihigpit dahil sa sakit na COVID-19. Pinatindi nito ang hirap na dinadanas nila mula pa 2017. Naaalala pa natin ang mga nasirang buhay at kabuhayan ng mga kapatid nating Muslim. Hanggang ngayon, hindi pa nila naramdaman ang rehab ng gobyerno,” he adds.
There are 422 families living in nine evacuation centers and community-based centers in Marawi, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says in a Mindanao briefer citing December data.
"More than 10,000 families are home-based or staying with host communities according to the Task Force Bangon Marawi. Validation continues in informal ECs and community-based centers."
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