ARMM is the only region in the Philippines that has its own government holding executive, legislative, and judicial branches of governance. Its regional government is headed by a Regional Governor and a Regional Vice-Governor directly elected by the people. It has a unicameral Regional Legislative Assembly (RLA) composed of assemblymen and assemblywomen that has the power to pass legislation with local as well as region-wide enforcement. Its officials are elected every three years separately and not in conjunction with the national and local elections in the country. The seat of the regional government is in Cotabato City, although this city is outside of its jurisdiction. ARMM governs within a large-scale government system with elected members of the congress or the lower house also represents the different congressional districts in areas of autonomous region that can actually influence and shape the health service delivery in the area. Under Executive Order No. 133, series of 1993, the mandate, tasks and functions of the DOH were partially transferred to ARMM. Its mandate is to promote, protect, preserve or restore the health of the people through the provision and delivery of health services through regulation and encouragement of providers of health goods and services. Specifically, it shall be primarily responsible for the formulation, planning, implementation and coordination of policies and programs for health. DOH-ARMM is directly under the administrative control and supervision of the Office of the Regional Governor. The Regional Health Secretary, a position that is coterminous with the Governor, heads the health department. Under the regional health secretary are the different provincial and city health officers.
C. Geographic Characteristics ARMM is located at the southwestern fringes of Mindanao (Figure 1). It is also strategically located in the Brunei Darussalam-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area (BIMP-EAGA). Its proximity to avian-flu afflicted Indonesia poses threat to the region and the country in general. It is mainly divided into contiguous mainland provinces and non-contiguous Island provinces. The mainland provinces are further sub-divided into Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao, and Shariff Kabunsuan, and the Islamic City of Marawi while the Island provinces are Basilan (including Lamitan City), Sulu and Tawi-Tawi. The difficult geographic condition in the ARMM, characterized by large expanses of mountainous areas in the mainland provinces and the geographically isolated island provinces, imposes a big burden on the ARMM‟s health system which is not felt in the other parts or regions of the country (WB, HD for peace and security, 2003). The region has a total land area of 13,435.26 square kilometers which is about 4.5 percent of the country‟s land area. It has a total of 113 municipalities which is subdivided into 2,504 barangays. There is frequent subdivision of municipalities to create new municipalities. This in turn affects the health service delivery both in the old and new municipalities.
Aside from the advantage of ARMM‟s location, a cache of investment opportunities can be found amidst its natural wealth. Lake Lanao is the biggest source of hydroelectric power in Mindanao. In spite of this, it is sad to note that it is catering electricity outside the region. ARMM boasts for its abundant marine, mineral, agricultural and forest resources which include banana, coconut, mangosteen, lanzones, durian, fish, seaweeds, abaca, basalt, chromites, manganese, gold, silver and copper. However, bananas and abacas are the common habitat of filariasis vector.
ARMM-wide Investment Plan for Health
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