COTABATO CITY (April 30, 2026) — The Bangsamoro social services ministry launched on Tuesday, April 28, its Beneficiary Data Management System (BDMS) to boost its public service thrusts, established with the help of the Australian government and an agency of the United Nations.
Officials of the Ministry of Social Services and Development-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, representatives from the Australian government and the United Nations Children’s Fund led the launching of the BDMS on Tuesday morning at the regional capitol in Cotabato City.
UNICEF was represented in the event by the chief of its Mindanao field office, Andreas Wuestenberg.
The BDMS is a unified beneficiary database system storing details about the beneficiaries of the ministry’s humanitarian programs, conflict-affected and calamity-stricken communities, persons with disabilities and marginalized elderly BARMM residents.
MSSD-BARMM officials explained to reporters, after the symbolic event at the Shariff Kabunsuan Cultural Complex in the Bangsamoro regional capitol, that the BDMS has consolidated details on recipients of essential government aid in the autonomous region.
MSSD-BARMM officials told reporters then, in the presence of representatives of the UNICEF and the Australian government, that the BDMS also has extensive data about the ministry’s 10 social protection programs covering households in the provinces of Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, Lanao del Sur, Basilan and Tawi-Tawi and in the cities of Lamitan, Marawi and Cotabato.
They also separately pointed out that the system is a remedy to irregularities in the implementation of their social protection programs in BARMM’s five provinces and three cities.
BARMM’s social services minister, the lawyer Raissa Jajurie, said their field workers can now maximize, with BDMS, their public service duties.
“We are grateful to the United Nations Children Fund and the Australian government and the officials of our social services ministry for cooperating in setting up this online data system,” said BARMM Chief Minister Abdulrauf Macacua.
He said among the sectors that would benefit much from the BDMS that the MSSD-BARMM shall operate are the poor Muslim, Christian and non-Moro indigenous communities in the autonomous region. []
