ARMM Gov. Mujiv Hataman. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO
COTABATO CITY – A total of 107 inmates were freed by the extremists Maute terror group that attacked Marawi City Tuesday afternoon, Governor Mujiv Hataman of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) on Wednesday said.
Hataman told reporters here that the 107 inmates, including some Maute group members, were freed after gunmen simultaneously stormed before sunset Tuesday the Malabang District Jail and the Marawi City Jail.
Hataman said the gunmen also commandeered vehicles parked inside the fenced facilities as they escaped.
Marawi City is the capital of Lanao del Sur, a component province of ARMM.
Hataman has sent Vice Gov. Al Rashid Lucman, currently DSWD secretary, to attend to the needs of displaced families.
Hataman said local officials are reaching out to non-Moro residents of Marawi City because of reports that the terrorist have threatened to execute on sight.
The ARMM Humanitarian Emergency Assistance Action and Response Team (HEART) is on standby to distribute some 20,000 food packs to displaced families in Marawi City, a disaster official also said.
Myrna Jocelyn Henry, ARMM-HEART media relations officer, said the relief goods are currently prepositioned in Malabang, Lanao del Sur, awaiting the go-signal from Hataman for them to enter the Marawi area with the clearance given by military authorities
Malabang town is only some 45 minutes away from Marawi City.
Henry stressed that another 4,000 relief packs together with 10,000 bottled water are still being readied by ARMM–HEART for dispatch to the Marawi area.
Hataman, in a hastily called press conference on Wednesday following a Regional Peace and Order Council meeting, said 50 percent of Marawi City residents have so far evacuated and have sought shelters to the nearby cities of Iligan and Cagayan de Oro.
As of the 2015 census, Marawi has a total population of 201,785 individuals.
The governor said the groups behind the Marawi siege are Maute Group and Abu Sayyaf Group members who have formed an alliance under the Dawla Islamiyah that is controlled by Isnilon Hapilon, the so-called emir of the Islamic State forces in the Philippines.
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