MARAWI CITY—Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III has underscored the crucial role played by the Al Amanah Islamic Investment Bank of the Philippines in rebuilding this devastated city and helping its residents overcome the challenge of starting a new future amid its destruction.

The Al Amanah Bank, Dominguez said, is vital in assisting businesses returning to Marawi as well as in providing microfinance services to people determined to rebuild their lives in this city.

“I hope the people of Marawi will, in turn, help sustain the Al Amanah branch with their deposits and their businesses. Very few banks have ventured back into this disrupted city. Al Amanah is here because it has a vital role to perform,” Dominguez said in a speech read for him by Executive Director Helen Habulan of the Municipal Development Fund Office (MDFO) during the reopening recently of the bank’s branch here.

Dominguez thanked the officers and staff of Al Amanah Bank for deciding to reopen their branch in this city as soon as it could.

“I am sure the Al Amanah Marawi branch will be helpful in the process of rebuilding this great city. The branch is ready to assist local businesses in their recovery and make available micro-financing products for the people of this great city determined to rebuild their lives,” the finance chief said.

Besides these essential functions, Dominguez said the bank will also perform the usual services of managing payrolls, administering the rehabilitation funds that will soon begin flowing into Marawi, and offering current account services for the businesses now returning to the city.

The new Al Amanah branch, located inside the main campus of the Mindanao State University (MSU) here, is equipped with two Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) that will serve depositors both within the school and in Marawi’s main business district.

Al Amanah Bank, whose key officers had trained with Deutsche Bank, a German investment institution, is fully compliant with Islamic banking practices. The bank became a subsidiary of the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) to enable it to financially recover.

With it now a DBP subsidiary, “we can rely on Al Amanah delivering the same quality of financial services and commitment to development banking as its mother institution,” Dominguez said.

Earlier, Dominguez said other sources of financing for these priority projects under the Bangon Marawi Comprehensive Rehabilitation and Recovery Plan (BMCRRP) approved in early April will come from the various government agencies, the regional government of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), the city government of Marawi, non-government organizations, development partners, and the private sector, Dominguez said.

He said the government is also considering holding a pledging session similar to what was done after Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) to help fund Marawi’s reconstruction efforts.

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