Hataman reappoints three trusted subordinate-execs

COTABATO CITY -– The newly-reelected Gov. Mujiv Hataman of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao has reappointed three executives in his office as an initial stride to reorganize the regional cabinet.Regional officials with co-terminus appointments” were asked by Hataman to resign effective June 30 for him to have a free hand in reorganizing the chain of leadership from the Office of the Regional Governor (ORG), touted as ARMM’s Little Malacañang, down to its component agencies.Hataman has reenlisted human rights lawyers Laisa Masuhud Alamia and Rasol Mitmog, Jr., and journalist Amir Mawallil as his executive secretary, chief of staff, and information director, respectively.The reappointment of the three officials was confirmed on Thursday by ranking employees in one of the divisions in the ORG, who tendered for them a modest, traditionally Moro kanduri” thanksgiving banquet.Alamia was Hataman’s alter ego when he first served as ARMM’s regional governor from 2013 until his reelection to a second term on May 9, 2016.Mitmug first worked as an appointed speaker of the ARMM’s 24-member Regional Assembly before Hataman took him in as his chief-of-staff in July 2013.Mawallil, a print journalist who had worked for a national newspaper prior to his entry into the ARMM government in early 2013, is back to being executive director of the region’s Bureau of Public Information. The bureau, as ARMM’s information conduit, facilitates the dissemination of the regional government’s peace and development initiatives and its accomplishments in its socio-economic, public works, health, education and rehabilitation thrusts in all of the region’s 116 towns.The ARMM covers the provinces of Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur, which are both in mainland Mindanao, and the island provinces of Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi.The ARMM, which is so politically and administratively unique, has a constitutionally-mandated charter, the Republic Act 9054 that devolved the functions and powers of national line agencies to the regional government, grouped together under Hataman’s office.It also has a 24-seat law-making body, also known as s Little Congress” of ARMM, composed of three representatives from each of the region’s eight congressional districts.