More World Bank funds for southern Philippines

DPA/Manila

A more than $5mn grant is funding reconstruction and development projects in conflict areas in the southern Philippines, the World Bank said yesterday.

The assistance is part of a trust fund set up in 2006 to speed up rehabilitation and create small businesses and jobs in the war-torn communities of Mindanao.

World Bank country director Motoo Konishi said the money was granted as the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), a rebel group, finalise details of a framework peace agreement signed in October. “This additional funding means that while the government and the MILF flesh out the details of the framework agreement on the negotiating table, the programme will continue to deliver much needed services to conflict-affected communities,” he said.

Twenty-one conflict-affected towns in Mindanao would benefit from the grant, the World Bank said.

Since the trust fund was set up six years ago, 240 projects have been completed in 75 municipalities. The framework peace agreement calls for the establishment of an autonomous region to be called Bangsamoro, which means Muslim nation, in Mindanao by 2016.

The 12,000-strong MILF had been fighting the Philippine government since 1978.