COTABATO CITY, Philippines – Technical personnel of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and the Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA) conducted on Tuesday an assessment of 46 return sites for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Maguindanao in a bid to push the resettlement of IDPs remaining in evacuations centers.

Teaming up for the first time in the field, MinDA and ARMM workers converged in Talayan, Maguindanao where many return sites are being established under the Early Recovery and Rehabilitation for Central Mindanao (ERRCM), a fresh venture backing the administration of ARMM acting Gov. Ansaruddin Alonto Adiong to send the IDPs back to their stable feet.

The assessment visits would precede the implementation of interventions for IDPs in conflict-affected communities in Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur, both of the ARMM, and in Lanao del Norte and North Cotabato, ERRCM head Suharto Abas said.

Abas said interventions, funded with four million euro, would include building and repair of houses, water and sanitation facilities, construction of health and education facilities, and provision of high-impact livelihood activities.

Upon its takeover of the ARMM reins in December, 2009, the Adiong regime tangled with the worsening plight of some 18,000 IDP families trapped in evacuation centers, some of them hesitant to return home because their houses were either damaged or cannibalized in the 2008 fighting between government forces and Moro rebels, officials said.

As this developed, the Adiong government launched an early recovery program aimed at sending the IDPs back to their respective villages and providing technical and material assistance for them to regain their lost socio-economic standings.

Foreign humanitarian entities from the United Nations have been tapped in the scheme.

Since then, only about 2,000 IDP families have not gone home, prompting the infusion to the early recovery program a fast-track building of core shelters in return (resettlement) sites for them. The state’s Social Welfare and Development spearheaded the thrust.

Meanwhile, at least 500 public schools pupils in depressed villages of Datu Odin Sinsuat town in Maguindanao received classroom supplies, including bags, notebooks and pens under the continuing “adopt a school” program of the ARMM’s present administration.

The recipients are pupils of the Kinebeka Elementary School, a remote school of the town listed as 61st beneficiary of the “adopt a school” program across the region, officials said.

The program was launched last summer by all bureaus, offices, and line agencies in the ARMM, which Adiong mandated to adopt one or more rural schools and provide pupils therein basic supplies including bags, notebooks, pens and books.

The Sunday’s distribution rite was led by ARMM Executive Secretary Naguib Sinarimbo and assisted by his wife Roslaini, who heads the Regional Economic Zone Authority (REZA), and officers of the Tactical Operations Group of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division.

Being the main implementing unit, Sinarimbo’s office adopted and served almost 20 rural schools already.

Sunday’s outreach activity also included nutrient food-feeding to pupils of the recipient school, according to Sinarimbo.

Teachers at the Kinebeka Elementary School hailed the outreach program, saying it was their first time to feel not only the presence of ARMM regional officials but also their assistance.

In his brief message, Sinarimbo conveyed to the villagers his standing offer to construct a two-classroom building in eight depressed villages that have insufficient school edifices out of the saving of the Office of the Regional Governor.