BANGSAMORO NEWS UPDATES

COTABATO CITY – Officials of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and the provincial government of Lanao del Sur are mapping out an anti-poverty strategy that would effectively bring down the province, within two years, from the top of the list of poorest provinces in the country.First quarter 2015 data from the Philippine Statistics Authority, the latest available, showed Lanao del Sur was the poorest province in the Philippines with 74.3% poverty incidence.During a special ARMM cabinet meeting and executive consultation held on Wednesday, February 22, involving top officials of

COTABATO CITY -- Regional Gov. Mujiv Hataman has expressed confidence the 60 police scalawags sent to the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) will perform well will be reformed. Hataman, who expressed strong opposition when news broke out that police scalawags from the National Capital Regional Police Office (NCRPO) will be sent to ARMM as punishment, has changed stance after PNP Director Gen. Ronald dela Rosa explained that the transfer was routinary in the PNP ranks. The regional governor earlier urged Dela Rosa not to make ARMM a dumping ground of corrupt police officers.

PAGADIAN CITY -- The ethnic Maguindanaon chairman of the largest group in the Moro National Liberation Front yielded his post on Sunday to a Tausug comrade after a nine-year markedly rigorous stint.The position of former Cotabato City Mayor Muslimin Sema, who assumed chairmanship of their group in 2008 based on a collegial central committee imprimatur, was taken over by former Sulu Congressman Yusoph Jikiri.The MNLF leadership transition rite was witnessed by Major Gen. Carlito Galvez, commander of the Zamboanga City-based Western Mindanao Command of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

COTABATO CITY – Thousands of residents in two barangays in this town now have a better access road, following the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao’s (ARMM) turnover of a P13.27-million project to the municipal government.ARMM Governor Mujiv Hataman led the turnover ceremony of the 1.3-kilometer access road at Barangay Mulaog here on Friday. The ceremony was also attended by Public Works and Highways-ARMM Secretary Engr.

COTABATO CITY --- Officials wants to extensively involve clerics in thwarting the alarming spread in Mindanao of Jihadist blocs in the fashion of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu, Basilan Gov. Jim Hataman and Lanao del Sur Vice Gov. Mamintal Adiong, Jr. separately recommended the enlistment of clerics in security efforts on Thursday during a meeting in Cotabato City of the security council of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.Mangudadatu told ARMM Gov.

CAMP SIONGCO, Maguindanao --With peace prevailing in its area of jurisdiction, the Army's 6th Infantry (Kampilan) Division, led by Brigadier General Arnel B. Dela Vega, 6th ID Multi-Sectoral Advisory Board, Goldin Institute Philippines (GIP) and the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), on Saturday launched its Peace and Development Program in a remote village in Maguindanao. The program, dubbed as Project Kagkapia (Hope), was launched with the support of Regional Governor Mujiv Hataman through the Humanitarian Emergency Action Response Team (HEART) and Dr.

MANILA -- The Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process (OPAPP) on Friday announced the new members of the expanded Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC)—a body that will draft the new Bangsamoro enabling law.The crafting of the law is part of the implementation process of the southern peace pact or the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB) signed between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in March 2014. President Rodrigo Roa Duterte has just released the appointment papers of the 21-member Bangsamoro Transition Commission.

COTABATO CITY– The Department of Social Welfare and Development's (DSWD) Central Office is conducting from February 6 to 11 a Partners’ Orientation and Planning Workshop in preparation for the pilot implementation of the 'Bangsamoro Umpungan sa Nutrisyon' (BangUN) in two provinces of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).The DSWD Central Office and its regional counterpart, DSWD-ARMM, will partner with several national and regional line agencies in targeting children ages 0-12 years old initially in the towns of Mamasapano, Datu Salibo, Datu Piang, Shariff Saidona Mustapha, Sharif

BULUAN, Maguindanao – More jobless Moro women, including widows of former secessionist guerillas, are gaining additional source of livelihood in inaul weaving, an age-old local cottage industry that the provincial government of Maguindanao has successfully saved from extinction and harnessed to boost eco-tourism development in this part of the country. Eman Aljani, chief of staff of Gov.

MAGUINDANAO --- The government will start constructing this month a P180 million worth bridge to connect the scenes of the January 25, 2015 Mamasapano incident to trading centers in Maguindanao.The bridge project, funded with an allocation from the annual infrastructure subsidy of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), shall be implemented by a private contractor, the Roma Construction Company.The firm will work along with the office of Engineer James Mlok, chief of Maguindanao’s Second District Engineering Office and the Department of Public Works and Highways-ARMM.Engineer Don