Member of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA)-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) Parliament and BTA Committee on Health Chairman Saffrullah M. Dipatuan lauded the House of the Representatives and the Senate for passing the Marawi Siege Victims Compensation Act, which now awaits the signature of President Rodrigo Duterte to become a law.
“Allahu Akbar! Alhamdulillah! [The] House of Representatives adopted the Senate version of the Marawi Compensation Bill!”, Dipatuan published on his Facebook page after the House adopted the Senate’s version of the bill, which is more popularly known as the Marawi compensation bill on February 3, 2022.
According to Dipatuan, the House’s adoption of the Senate version fast-tracked the passing of the Marawi Compensation Bill since it will dispense the need for a bicameral conference committee meeting.
The said bill will provide monetary aid to the victims who lost their residential and commercial properties due to the conflict between the Armed Forces of the Philippines and terrorist groups back in 2017 in Marawi City if enacted into law.
Since 2017, Dipatuan has been advocating for his fellow internally displaced persons (IDPs) of the Marawi conflict through the Marawi Reconstruction Conflict Watch movement.
When the bill was being deliberated in the Senate for its third and final reading, the International Alert Philippines, another civic group supporting the Marawi Reconstruction Conflict Watch movement, posted a video message of Dipatuan calling on the “Senate to expedite the passage of the Marawi Compensation bill so there is enough time for President [Duterte] to sign this into law.”
Pending the passage of the Marawi Compensation Bill into law, Dipatuan, as the BTA Health Chairman, likewise proposed bills in BARMM to cater the needs of the IDPs with the creation of new public hospitals and upgrading of existing hospitals in BARMM.