WB resumes all its projects in Maguindanao

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – The World Bank (WB) has resumed the implementation of all its projects in Maguindanao which it suspended following the Nov. 23, 2009 election-related massacre of 57 people, mostly journalists, in the province.

Engineer Naguib Sinarimbo, manager of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Social Fund Project (ASFP), said the WB suspended all its projects in Maguindanao as it feared for the safety of its personnel carrying these out in politically troubled areas in the province.

The ASFP is the conduit of the WB and the Japan International Cooperation Agency for their projects in the autonomous region.

“We now have the World Bank’s green light to resume the implementation of all its projects in Maguindanao,” Sinarimbo said.

The suspension of WB projects came just weeks after the killing of 57 people, including at least 30 journalists, in Ampatuan town.

Then Datu Unsay mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. and other members of the Ampatuan clan are now undergoing prosecution in connection with the massacre.

The victims were on their way to the provincial capitol in Shariff Aguak town to file the certificate of candidacy of then Buluan vice mayor Esmael Mangudadatu when they were flagged down, herded in a nearby hinterland and killed with machineguns and assault rifles. Mangudadatu eventually won as governor.

The WB has been implementing community-initiated socio-economic and infrastructure projects for impoverished communities in Maguindanao for about a decade now.

In the past six years, WB experts have rated all of the agency’s projects in the ARMM as “satisfactory.”