Scars, unexploded bombs have lingered since Philippine siege
MARAWI, Philippines — Thousands of displaced remain in emergency shelters and the threat of Islamic extremists and unexploded bombs lingers in the rubble of a southern Philippine city, where survivors on Wednesday remembered a disastrous five-month siege by Islamic State group-aligned fighters that began a year ago.
The Rev. Teresito Soganub, who survived 117 days of captivity by the extremists in Marawi city, said that aside from the devastation, it would take years for him and other civilians to overcome the horror of having lived through airstrikes and gunbattles that threatened them day and night.
“I’m still very, very far from a full recovery,” Soganub said by telephone. “If it takes long to rebuild and reconstruct, it’s more difficult to deal with this psychological and psychiatric trauma.”
The government is finalizing a plan to rebuild the most devastated commercial and residential districts, where the carcasses of pockmarked homes, buildings and mosques stand eerily and gathering weeds in an urban wasteland guarded by troops.