Families in site of govt, NPA clash get aid

NORTH COTABATO, Philippines – More than a hundred families benefited from the outreach mission of the provincial government on Wednesday for villagers dislocated by recent attacks by the New People’s Army in the hinterland Magpet town in the province.

Workers dispatched by the office of North Cotabato Gov. Emmylou Taliño-Mendoza had distributed food provisions to the evacuees from Magpet’s Barangays Barangay Manobisa and Amabel, scenes of recent hostilities between government forces and the New People’s Army.

The relief mission was a joint initiative of Mendoza’s office, the inter-agency provincial disaster risk reduction and management operations center, and the provincial social welfare office.

The 107 families that received food supplies were forced to abandon their villagers and relocate to safer areas due to persistent attacks by NPAs that mulct money from farmers and rig roadside bombs along farmer-to-market roads to intimidate and force them into shelling out excessive revolutionary taxes.

Magpet Mayor Florenito Gonzaga, chairman of the municipal peace and order council, said the tension in the two barangays have started to wane, but the evacuees are reluctant to return to their villages fearing the rebels would return anytime and harass them again.

“I am very grateful for the help extended by the provincial government to my constituents in Manobisa and Amabel who are in dire need of assistance because of the miserable situation they are in,” the town mayor said.