COTABATO CITY, Philippines - Authorities rescued Thursday night 104 evacuees, 57 of them children, from Sabah after their boat bound for Tawi-Tawi broke down and drifted to an open sea near Sulu.
The evacuees were immediately transported by local officials and uniformed government operatives to the Jolo wharf in downtown Jolo, capital of Sulu, using a Coast Guard patrol craft, their derelict boat, M/L Okey, also towed to safety.
Reports reaching the executive department here of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) said the evacuees have already been fed and provided with clothes and rehydration liquids by the provincial government of Sulu.
Sulu Board Member Butch Ezquierdo, who is a member of the Sulu provincial crisis management committee, told reporters via text message that the military managed to promptly supply the evacuees with food and water dropped into their boat by Air Force helicopters before dusk last Thursday.
Local officials learned of the plight of the evacuees on board the boat, whose engine conked out while sailing for Bongao, an island town in Tawi-Tawi, from Tausog fisherman.
More than 3,000 migrant Filipinos from Sabah, originally from ARMM and surrounding administrative regions, have returned to the country, driven away by the hostilities in the resource-rich island between Malaysian security forces and followers of Sultan Jamalul Kiram.