Covi19 to slow down govt programs in 6 months, execs foresee

COTABATO CITY — Moro officials foresaw Friday what they said was a six-month slowed-down operation in most government programs, but more focus is in place for healthcare and other social services amid domino-effects of the covid19 pandemic.

BARMM Executive Secretary Abdulraof Macacua of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) urged local leaders to unite instead of blaming each other, especially when it was involving delivery of foods for relief assistance to residents under restrictions of localized enhanced community quarantine.

Lawyer Naguib Sinarimbo, speaking for Chief Minister Al-Hadj Murad Ibrahim, said the BARMM government wants heads of agencies and mid-level executives to adjust on programs to suit to current emergency situations, and strengthen response to rising community needs for provision of basic commodities.

Sinarimbo, who is also BARMM’s interior and local government minister, said the regional government was also thankful to the Philippine Air Forces (PAF) for sending on flight a C-130 Carrier from Manila on Wednesday to airlift medical supplies and equipment for use by the region’s medics, paramedics and security volunteers.

He said distribution of relief goods also started in some villages here on Thursday and on Friday.

Medical equipment and supplies, including personal protective equipment (PPEs) were also shared with the Cotabato Regional Medical Center as a common medical facility for residents and populations nearby, BARMM volunteers said.

Enhanced community quarantine affects movement of workers and goods across localized boundary restrictions.

Sinarimbo said the Bangsamoro leadership also mulls of providing financial assistance to its employees regardless of whether they are holding permanent appointments or contracts of services.

Macacua said he was rushing to a prior-slated meeting with representatives of the United Nations World Food Programme (UN-WFP) when he himself was being denied entry of the city boundary by some personnel of an inter-agency local task force.

The meeting was about storage of food supplies at a humanitarian warehouse in Polloc Freeport in Maguindanao, and on disposition plans of action in aid of poor families amid the crisis.

Sinarimbo said BARMM is also seriously considering the urgency of aiding its local government units (LGUs) with emergency assistance funds, namely: Five million pesos for each of the region’s five component provinces; one million pesos for each of 116 municipalities; P 2 million for each city, and P 500 thousand for each of the 63 barangays of Cotabato Province which opted to join the BARMM in the February 2019 plebiscite.