Outreach activities cap off 1st anniversary of VP’s office in BARMM

COTABATO CITY — Employees of the public service outfit of the Office of the Vice President on Tuesday celebrated the first anniversary of their operation in the Bangsamoro region with medical outreach missions that benefitted no fewer than 300 marginalized Muslim and Christian patients.

The satellite office of Vice President Sara Duterte in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao is located along Sinsuat Avenue, Cotabato Coty, established on Jan. 4, 2023.

Zuhaira Abas, who is overseeing the OVP-BARMM Satellite Office, and a team from the office of Bangsamoro parliament member Kadil Monera Sinolinding Jr., a physician-ophthalmologist, facilitated free eye examination for 143 individuals on Tuesday. Fifteen of them listed for cataract and pterygium surgery.

Sinolinding also functions as BARMM health minister in concurrent capacity.

The 15 cataract and pterygium patients shall undergo surgery at the clinic of Sinolinding, whose public eye care team had served more than 3,000 poor Muslim and Christian eye patients since he was appointed member of the 80-seat BARMM parliament in August 2022 by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

More than 60 other residents were also listed for free blood chemistry examination in the clinic of the physician John Maliga, who is a senior medical staff of the Cotabato Regional Medical Center.

“We are thankful to different government entities supporting our operation in this part of Mindanao for 12 months now,” Abas told reporters who covered their activities on Tuesday.

Records distributed on Tuesday to reporters by Abas and her staff indicated that in the past 11 months, they have provided medical assistance, facilitated the hospitalization and gave out wheelchairs to 3,979 residents of BARMM.

The OVP-BARMM Satellite Office, during the period, also distributed bags and school supplies to 17,026 Muslim and Christian learners in schools in this city and in nearby towns in BARMM’s adjoining Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte and Lanao del Sur provinces and in the 63 Bangsamoro barangays in different towns in Cotabato province in Region 12.

The OVP-BARMM Satellite Office had also distributed no less than 30,000 food packs,