COTABATO CITY, 4 October 2004 — Around 10,000 residents from two towns of Maguindanao province in the southern Philippines have been forced to leave their homes due to floods caused by non-stop rains since Friday, officials said.
Badly affected by floods were the towns of Muntawal and Pagalungan, where hundreds of houses and buildings, including the town halls, were under waist-deep water from the overflowing Rio Grande de Mindanao (Pulangi) River.
Pagalungan town Mayor Janggo Muntawal appealed to higher authorities to declare the 2 towns as calamity areas, which would enable the local governments to receive relief and rehabilitation funds from the national government. “Many of our constituents who are either farmers or fishermen have lost their means of livelihood and we badly need the national government’s help in meeting this emergency situation. We have no means to address the present crisis,” the mayor said on radio.
Part of Pikit town, a battleground between government troops and fighters of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) last year, was also partly affected by floods, officials said.
