MANILA, Philippines — A network of groups from Mindanao has pressed the government to fast-track the rebuilding of Marawi City, as it said many who were displaced by the Maute siege four years ago have yet to return home despite promises.
The battle between state forces and the Islamic State-inspired group stretched for four months in 2017. In its wake were 370,000 forced out of their homes, and a cost of damage at P11.5 billion.
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In a joint statement, members of the Marawi Advocacy Accompaniment urged the Duterte administration to prioritize the return of internally displaced persons to their communities and compensate victims.
"Four years after the siege, most of the promises...remain unfulfilled," MAA said in a May 22 statement. "President Rodrigo Duterte's promise saying that Marawi will rise as a prosperous city again remains invisible and cannot be felt on the ground."
Last year, the president said reconstruction there has not been easy and cited the clearing of lands from explosives and settling titles as prolonging the efforts. He was responding to a watchdog which flagged the rebuilding as slow and lacking in funds.
A task force official has told the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism on how the pandemic posed a significant impact on the progress there.
"We had to stop construction activities," said Asec. Felix Castro Jr. as quoted by PCIJ in its report. "When we resumed the projects, many workers did not come back so we had to look for new people."
While buildings, roads and utilities have risen in the war-torn city, many residents have yet to secure building permits while others simply had no money, PCIJ also noted.
Despite this, officials remain confident that work will be completed by December 2021, a date that Housing Secretary Eduardo del Rosario told senators in September last year.
The MAA sought from the national government and the task force to make public all information on the status of reconstruction, as well as on public spending and other attendant issues.
It added that persons displaced from Marawi remain in temporary shelters, making them more vulnerable to the threat of COVID-19.
"This multiple-displacement aggravated by the government's slow rehabilitation and reconstruction program has deprived the bakwits of much-needed opportunities for economic survival amid pandemic period," MAA said.
Members stressed that rebuilding Marawi is not only through public infrastructures, but also on getting people back to their lives and addressing issues of those who survived.
The months-long effort to reclaim the city resulted in 168 deaths from government troops, 114 civilians, 270 unidentified individuals and 924 from the Maute group, per figures from a report by the Asian Development Bank. — Christian Deiparine