Marawi folk start search for kin lost in war

MEAL TIMEFamily members share a meal as they return to check on their home in war-torn Marawi City in the last week of October after the government declared the end of the five-month war against terrorists. —JEOFFREY MAITEM

MARAWI CITY — Bringing with them photographs of their husbands, fathers and sons, relatives of those still missing in the five-month battle against Islamic State-inspired terrorists in this city gathered at the provincial capitol on Monday to seek help in finding their loved ones.

Onboard a coaster provided by the provincial government, Meljie Powao, 24, and Alma Tome, 30, left an evacuation center in Iligan City and cried as the vehicle entered Marawi. Both were looking for their husbands who were working on a road project here when armed men belonging to the Maute and Abu Sayyaf groups laid siege to the city on May 23.

Alma’s husband, Roel, and Meljie’s husband, Victor, were scheduled to go home after their working hours on the day the armed men attacked.

The last time Alma talked to Roel was when she called him on May 23. Roel, however, told her to stop calling because armed men were outside the house where they were hiding.

“I’m not the only one who lost a husband. My young children also lost a father,” she said.

“Why are we having this problem when we had nothing to do with this war?” she asked.

She said she wanted to look for a job to sustain the needs of their two children, ages 2 and 1, but admitted it would be difficult because no one would look after them.

“I hope [our husbands] are still alive,” she said.

Alma said she was not ready to accept that her husband was dead—the reason she went to Marawi to seek answers from the military, or to read the list of rescued hostages, hoping that Roel’s name would be on it.

Meljie, on the other hand, is hoping that her husband is alive after the revelation of arrested Indonesian fighter Mohammad Ilham Syahputra that there are fighters left in the battle zone.

“The military said there were hostages who were forced to carry firearms and fight. Maybe my husband is one of them,” Meljie said.

“I just hope the military will not shoot him,” she added.

Should her husband be arrested, Meljie said she was hoping that the military would treat him well and would not harm him “because I know he is not a bad person.”

Rubelyn Cosmo, 25, joined Alma and Meljie. She was looking for her father, Rene, who was also working in Marawi when the fighting erupted.

Meljie said she last saw Rene during a drinking spree with her husband, Victor, on May 15.

Another woman looking for her husband is Miralyn Tome, 28, now eight months pregnant to her second child.

She said she last talked to her husband, Jamel, days after war broke out.

“Even if there were gunfire on the background, even while there were air strikes, he called up to ask if there was still milk for our firstborn,” she said.

“I just hope he comes home,” she added.

Government personnel here took DNA samples from the women. These samples will be matched with specimens taken from the bodies and skeletal remains buried in a cemetery here. —Divina M. Suson