Foreign donors bring solar power to isolated BARMM hospital

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — The government of Japan and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) have provided the Tamparan Provincial Hospital in Tamparan, Lanao del Sur with a solar energy-generating system to boost its operation and in support of the Bangsamoro government’s health services in the province.

The newly-established solar power-generating system in the hospital was launched on Thursday, December 4, by UNDP’s representative to the Philippines, Knut Ostby, and the physician-ophthalmologist Kadil Sinolinding Jr., who is health minister of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

The UNDP, the Japanese government and the Ministry of Health-BARMM are also presently setting up a solar power-generating system each in the Provincial Infirmary in Marawi City, in the Wao District Hospital and in the Dr. Serapio Montañer Memorial Hospital in Wao and in Malabang towns in Lanao del Sur, respectively.

The two foreign donors have allocated P9.3 million for the projects while the MoH-BARMM shall, as counterpart, pay for labor costs.

Ostby, while in Tamparan last Tuesday, said the UNDP is ready to support, via complementary initiatives, the public service programs of the MoH-BARMM.

Sinolinding, acting chief of the Tamparan Provincial Hospital, said he and his co-workers in the MoH-BARMM are grateful to the UNDP and the Japanese government for embarking on the solar power-generation projects for their medical service facilities in Lanao del Sur, one of the five provinces in the Bangsamoro region.

“We can save the lives of our sick constituents, hasten their recovery from illnesses via a non-stop operation of these medical facilities, energized by solar power provided by the United Nations Development Programme and the government of Japan,” Sinolinding said in a message during Thursday’s event at the Tamparan Provincial Hospital.

Sinolinding, also a member of the 80-seat Bangsamoro parliament, said the continuing support of the Japanese government, the UNDP and other entities under the United Nations, including the International Labour Organization, to the peace and community-development initiatives of the BARMM government is a strong vote of confidence for the region's lawmaking body, which is overseeing all of its ministries and support agencies.