1,000 families displaced by Zambo siege missing?

ZAMBOANGA CITY - More than 1,000 families, who were among those displaced by the bloody siege last year in this city, have not been accounted for, a local official handling the evacuees' resettlement said on Monday.

Assistant City Administrator Elmeir Apolinario, head of the temporary settlement cluster, announced the discovery as the government gradually moved hundreds of families from the camp sites to the resettlement and transitory sites.

Apolinario said the city government has to move 8,000 families of Internally displaced persons (IDPs) to the temporarily resettlement sites, but they have only accounted for at least 7,000 families.

“The 1,000 plus remained unaccounted for and are being traced,” Apolinario told newsmen in a briefing at the city hall.

He said they are now conducting the revalidation through the tagging of IDPs to determine the whereabouts of the unaccounted number of families.

Bautista said they are also not discounting the possibility that the unaccounted number of families are those earlier discovered as "fake evacuees."

Meanwhile, Apolinario was optimistic that the resettlement of thousands of displaced families affected by the siege staged by the rebels of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) will be completed within the 18-month timeline given by President Benigno Aquino III.

He said the Phase 1 Package consisting of 3,184 housing units, and Hhase 2 Package of 523 units are already up for implementation while the third phase consisting of 6,22 units is also being prepared and expected to be completed in a month or before the end of June.