COTABATO CITY”•The Mamasapano clash in 2014 may have torpedoed the planned Bangsamoro Transitional Authority, but the lessons from it also helped the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao prepare for the five-month terrorist-driven crisis in Marawi City and pave the way for a better future for the strife-torn region.
This and other points were raised by ARMM Regional Governor Mujiv Hataman in his recent State of the Region Address at the Shariff Kabunsuan Cultural Complex here.
Hataman said the regional government will continue “to help and meet the needs” of the residents of Marawi and its environs, five months after Abu Sayyaf and Maute Group-led terrorists laid siege to the lakeside city in a bid to claim it for the Islamic State.
The regional government has already set aside P450 million for Marawi’s relief efforts this year, and another P930 million in 2018 to aid the city’s rehabilitation, the governor added.
Hataman told ARMM officials and guests that when he delivered his regional report in 2014, he thought it would be his last SORA.
“I thought then, and even you probably did too, that the Bangsamoro Transitional Authority would temporarily replace the ARMM regional government while the real Bangsamoro government would be built,” the governor said.
But the Mamasapano incident, which saw 44 Special Action Force policemen slain in Maguindanao province in an attempt to capture or kill wanted Malaysian terrorist and bomb-maker Zulkifli Abdhir alias Marwan, dashed the hopes for that Bangsamoro government, Hataman noted.
Now, the ARMM is weathering the crisis brought about by the attempted takeover of Marawi, which led President Rodrigo Duterte to declare martial law in Mindanao.
“We may be facing this test now, but the lessons we learned from Mamasapano and other crises we have been through allowed us to respond faster to the situation in Marawi,” Hataman said.
This allowed the regional government to quickly organize a Crisis Management Committee, made up of employees and volunteers that had also put up the ARMM Hotline and Emergency Response Center, the governor added. Ayunan Gunting-Al-Hadj
The group received over 500 calls in the first days of the crisis, besides text messages from residents of Marawi and their relatives, allowing ARMM to send Regional Vice Governor Haroun Alrashid Lucman Jr. to the city to coordinate with the local government, Hataman added.
“On the third day, we went there ourselves, and we convened the Provincial Crisis Management Committee with the provincial government of Lanao del Sur and the Marawi LGU,” the governor said.