Catholic Church to bring P10-M humanitarian aid to Marawi evacuees

FILE: The evacuees who end up at the provincial government’s headquarters. (Photo: City Government of Marawi/Facebook)

MANILA — The Catholic Church is providing a PHP10-million humanitarian response to the families affected by the ongoing crisis in Marawi City.

According to National Secretariat for Social Action (NASSA)/Caritas Philippines Executive Secretary Fr. Edwin Gariguez, the project will benefit 3,000 families or 15,000 individuals from 12 communities in Iligan City.

The response will cover the essential needs of the evacuees such as halal food, and non-food items like hygiene kits, household items and sleeping kits.

“We are targeting the home-based evacuees or those staying in their relatives’ houses because our assessment showed that many were still underserved. The concentration of the responses by other organizations are mostly in the evacuation centers,” he said in a statement.

The NASSA/Caritas Philippines will also conduct psychosocial activities, hygiene promotion awareness, emergency preparedness, and accountability trainings.

The response is being implemented through the newly-formed operations group comprising of religious sisters and lay volunteers of the Diocese of Iligan.

Earlier, the humanitarian, development, and advocacy arm of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) launched a solidarity appeal to all 85 dioceses nationwide. Among those which responded to the appeal were the dioceses of Jaro, Lucena, Iba, Imus, Alaminos, Antipolo, Bacolod, Bontoc-Lagawe, San Jose and Calapan.

Likewise, it allocated PHP2-million relief assistance to those affected by the crisis in Marawi through the Diocese of Iligan Social Action Center.

According to the Office of the Civil Defense-National Emergency Operations Center showed a total of 102,860 families or 465,674 individuals were displaced by the armed conflict in Marawi.

A total 4,977 families or 27,0004 individuals are staying in 85 evacuation centers while 97,883 families or 438,685 persons are home-based or staying with their relatives in eight regions. (Ferdinand G. Patinio/PNA)