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KEEPING THE SCHOOL CLEAN

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On May 23, 2017, conflict broke out in Marawi City between the Armed Forces of the Philippines and armed fighters from two ISIL-affiliated groups – Abu Sayyaf and the Maute. This led to a 5-month siege that destroyed most of the city’s central commercial district and forced 350,000 people to evacuate their homes. 5% of the evacuees stayed in evacuation centers while 95% choose to stay with relatives and friends in nearby communities.

The host communities where the evacuees stayed were caught unprepared with the massive influx of people. Food, health, water, sanitation and other basic services for the displaced population were severely compromised. Action Against Hunger personnel were on the ground two days after the conflict started to assess the situation and determine the urgent humanitarian needs of the affected population. Emergency Response projects in Food & Nutrition, Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH), Food Security and Livelihoods, and Shelter started on June 1, 2017 and continues to this day.

These are the voices of the people who endured the Siege of Marawi through resilience and determination.

 

Built in 1965 for the education of children of farming families from the remote areas of Pantao Ragat, the Aloon Elementary School’s problems on water, sanitation and hygiene were as old as the school.

Norphia M. Ombawa, 33, was a student from the school and now teaches there.  She observed that her pupils are experiencing the same situation she had as an elementary student before. There were no water facilities in the campus because the water tank for rainwater storage was already rotting in rust with age.  They were using plastic containers to catch water when it rains. During the dry season, they had to fetch water from a spring which was a distance from their school.

“Our toilet which was made of wood collapsed a few years back so we didn’t have one to use. Our pupils would go under the trees at the back of the school to urinate and sometimes, to defecate”, she said.

With the line of trees just a few meters from their classroom, sometimes the smell of feces would go through their windows and distract their classes. Some of her pupils would also smell bad throughout the day because of being improperly washed. She worried that their exposure to germs would get them sick.

The local government responded to the water concern by connecting the school’s pipes to the water storage facility in the Mosque across the street.  But, the lack of a toilet for the students to use was still a problem and open defecation continued.

This situation became more difficult when several families displaced due to the Marawi Conflict took refuge in their village on May 2017. The number of pupils spiked up with children from the displaced population enrolling at the school.  They went back to having less water, if none at all because the Mosque’s water tank was also shared with the refugees.

So when the Action Against Hunger tracked the displacement of children in the village, they also heard the concerns of the teachers on the school’s lack of toilet and their own water access facilities.

Action Against Hunger’s mobile team was already working in the area answering the needs of the displaced population and got word of the school’s concern. With the funding from the United Nations Children’s Fund and the United Nations Central Emergency Response Fund, the organization built a tap stand for handwashing, tooth brushing and drinking water. A two-door concrete toilet was also constructed within the school grounds.

Action Against Hunger personnel held a series of hygiene promotion sessions to the students, teaching them the importance of proper sanitation & hygiene to avoid the spread of diseases.  These sessions also trained them on the proper way to hand wash and brush their teeth. After these sessions, each student was given a hygiene kit that contained soap, shampoo, toothbrush, toothpaste and towels that they could use every day in school and at home.

Norphia integrated the messages and techniques from these sessions in her classes and continues to remind them about the importance of being clean and keeping the surroundings clean as well.

“They became conscious on their hygiene and the cleanliness of the school. Their parents also told me that they brought this practice at home”, she shared.  ●

A FRESH START

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On May 23, 2017, conflict broke out in Marawi City between the Armed Forces of the Philippines and armed fighters from two ISIL-affiliated groups – Abu Sayyaf and the Maute. This led to a 5-month siege that destroyed most of the city’s central commercial district and forced 350,000 people to evacuate their homes. 5% of the evacuees stayed in evacuation centers while 95% choose to stay with relatives and friends in nearby communities.

The host communities where the evacuees stayed were caught unprepared with the massive influx of people. Food, health, water, sanitation and other basic services for the displaced population were severely compromised. Action Against Hunger personnel were on the ground two days after the conflict started to assess the situation and determine the urgent humaniarian needs of the affected population. Emergency Response projects in Food & Nutrition, Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH), Food Security and Livelihoods, and Shelter started on June 1, 2017 and continues to this day.

 

These are the voices of the people who endured the Siege of Marawi through resilience and determination.

On May 24, 2017, the morning after the conflict started in Marawi City, Noraida Ombar and her family left their home in Brgy. Lilod Madaya. With no means of transportation, she, her husband, and her 11 children walked for more than two hours to Brgy. Alinun, Saguiaran where her brother waited.

“My children almost fainted because of the heat and the exhaustion. We were so scared that we didn’t notice how hungry we were until we arrived here,” she said.

Her brother Macalayo welcomed them to his house where other displaced relatives also took refuge. She noticed that the sack of rice her brother gave to all the visitors was soon empty as more displaced relatives came in the succeeding days.

Knowing that their hosts also have their own families’ needs to take care of, she and her family relied mostly on the food aid that the government and other humanitarian organizations were giving.

However, the distance of Brgy. Alinun from the town center made delivery of the food aid inconsistent.  And when government food aid did come, it was not enough for her large family. The week’s supply of food only lasted for a few days.

This food insufficiency was noted by the Action Against Hunger mobile team when they passed Brgy Alinunin on September 2017.  The organization was doing an assessment of the needs of the displaced families who choose not to live in evacuation centers.  According to data from UNOCHA, 94% of the 360,000 people who were forced to flee opted to stay with relatives.

With funding from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), Action Against Hunger distributed food aid kits enough for a month’s food supply for each family in the Barangay.  When Noraida opened her family’s kit, she was pleased to find dried fish, eggs, cooking oil, biscuits, mung beans, fruits and vegetables.

“We had been eating so much canned food that having fresh food we can cook was a relief for us,”, she said

The first meal that she cooked and shared with her family reminded her how good wholesome fresh and nutritious food was for them.  Before long, she and her husband were cultivating rice substitutes like cassava, taro and sweet potatoes on a patch of land that her brother lent them.  However, backyard farming with only a few tools they borrowed from their new neighbors was tedious.

Action Against Hunger engineers were building a communal toilet and installing a water reservoir in her community at this time.  Noraida asked if she could have the construction tools to use for farming once construction was done.  When the structures were completed, they gave her a shovel, a rake, a trowel, shears, a hoe, gloves and a wheelbarrow.

Farming was more efficient with these tools, so much so that Noraida added more variety and planted tomatoes, spring onions, okra, eggplant, bell peppers and other vegetables.

“We can’t go on relying on food aid or be a burden to our relatives. At least, with this garden, we could grow some nutritious food for our everyday consumption,”, she said.

When they harvested some of their crops for the first time, their fellow refugees were encouraged to follow their example.  Noraida lent them the tools and they also started their own backyard farms. They are now planning to ask the barangay to use some of the idle lands to start a communal vegetable garden●

A MOTHER’S MILK

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On May 23, 2017, conflict broke out in Marawi City between the Armed Forces of the Philippines and armed fighters from two ISIL-affiliated groups – Abu Sayyaf and the Maute. This led to a 5-month siege that destroyed most of the city’s central commercial district and forced 350,000 people to evacuate their homes. 5% of the evacuees stayed in evacuation centers while 95% choose to stay with relatives and friends in nearby communities.

The host communities where the evacuees stayed were caught unprepared with the massive influx of people. Food, health, water, sanitation and other basic services for the displaced population were severely compromised. Action Against Hunger personnel were on the ground two days after the conflict started to assess the situation and determine the urgent humanitarian needs of the affected population. Emergency Response projects in Food & Nutrition, Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH), Food Security and Livelihoods, and Shelter started on June 1, 2017 and continues to this day.

These are the voices of the people who endured the Siege of Marawi through resilience and determination.

 

Idalia Beruar, 33, nursed her 2-month old daughter Queenie while her husband Ibrahim fed their two boys in one of the makeshift living quarters at the gymnasium-turned-evacuation center in Barangay Sta. Elena, Iligan City. After all they had been through, she was glad that all four of them were alive and well.

She was four months pregnant when they fled the armed conflict from Marawi City. They took the route which passed through the forest because gunshots were heard from the highways. The road was rough with rocks and slippery with mud. It took them hours to trek it with one child on her husband’s back and the other one on his arms. The heat and the tedious hike soon made them thirsty. Having brought no water with them, they resorted to drinking from any water source they could find along the path.

It was when they were walking through the municipality of Tagoloan when their 2-year old son Delmar got sick. “He was so pale and he kept on throwing up and had loose bowels. We stopped a car and asked the owner to take us to a hospital because I feared that our son might not last the journey,” she said.

At the Iligan City hospital, the doctor who attended to Delmar saved him from severe dehydration. He was discharged a few days later and joined his family at the evacuation center where they found a space to live in. The experience made Idalia careful on what her children ate and drank.

Fortunately, their first month in the evacuation center fell on the celebration of the holy Ramadan. Cooked food and purified drinking water were donated by their fellow Muslims who were not displaced by the armed conflict.

After that month, they relied mainly on the relief goods from government agencies and other organizations responding to the crisis. However, the food donations were mostly canned goods and instant noodles. Idalia was concerned that, with her being pregnant and her children still less than five years old, they were not getting the right nutrition they needed.

“I suffered from urinary tract infection. Maybe it was because of too much salt intake from the canned goods. My children also got thinner as the days went by,” she shared.

Starting September 2017, Action Against Hunger, with support from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), brought food aid kits for pregnant women, lactating mothers and families with children aged less than five years old. Idalia remembered the sack of good quality rice, mung beans, dried fish, fruits and vegetables included among the many items in the food aid kit they received.

“I cooked the mung beans with the dried fish and moringa leaves. My children ate it well with the delicious rice they gave us,” she shared.

She and other pregnant women and lactating mothers were also encouraged by Action Against Hunger personnel to attend a seminar on breastfeeding and infant and children care practices funded by the Spanish Cooperation for International Development (AECID). Idalia pointed out that she had always breastfed her children because they did not like the formula she prepared for them. But in the seminar, she learned that breastmilk is still the most nutritious food for the baby. She and her co-participants were also taught to massage their breasts to produce more milk when the baby is suckling from them.

“I was amazed also that the mothers who trained us brought their babies to the seminar, breastfed them, bathe them and changed their diapers for all of us to see,” Idalia said.

When she delivered her baby Princess on November 2, 2017, Idalia applied what she learned in the seminar and breastfed her baby. She also made it a habit to hydrate with water and vegetable soup. She also maintained taking ferrous sulfate and Vitamin A to keep herself strong and healthy. Today, at two months, Princess weighs six kilos and is always at her mother’s side.

The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority were conducting skills training for livelihood at the evacuation center Idalia’s family was situated.  Even though she was taking care of two boys and a newborn, Idalia grabbed the opportunity to sign-up for these courses for livelihood opportunities while they were indefinitely staying at the evacuation center.  Having seen the mothers who trained them during the child-care seminar bringing their babies while working, she brought Princess along with her when she attended the training classes.

“At first, it was difficult because she’s already heavy. But I wanted her to nurse her any time she needed to.” ●