Marawi Siege Compensation Leaves Thousands Waiting — SkimNews
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- The 2017 Marawi siege between the Philippine military and Islamic State-linked gunmen killed more than 1,000 people, mostly civilians, and left over 300 individuals missing according to the International Committee of the Red Cross.
- The Marawi Compensation Board has paid out about 6.5 billion pesos (S$131.5 million) so far, but at least half of an estimated 14,000 claimants remain unpaid, and the board's mandate expires in 2028.
- Sophia Aminolla, a nurse and mother of two whose younger brother Amerel disappeared after being injured by an explosion, had her family's claim rejected for lacking a government death certificate; she now leads an advocacy group for the war missing.
- Roughly 10% of Marawi's 2017 population of about 200,000 have yet to return or be resettled, with displaced families at the Sagonsongan site still living in cramped 16 sq m units they were supposed to vacate in 2022.
- Drieza Lininding, chairman of the Moro Consensus Group, said the siege destroyed not only physical structures but 'the social fabric of our community,' as some graves at the hilltop cemetery hold as many as six bodies in numbered, nameless plots.
Why it matters: With the Marawi Compensation Board's mandate expiring in 2028 and at least 7,000 of 14,000 claimants still waiting, survivors face a hard deadline for any redress. For families of the missing — like Sophia Aminolla, whose claim was rejected — money is secondary to the unresolved question of what happened to their loved ones, leaving the Bangsamoro region's first Sept 13 elections to unfold against deep, unfinished trauma.
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