By Noel Y. Punzalan
COTABATO CITY, Mar. 22 (PNA) – Maguindanao officials are eyeing the return of 125,302 evacuees cramped in 75 evacuation centers across the province to their respective villages soon.
This came about after Maguindanao Governor Esmael Mangudadatu had urged mayors of his 36-town province to oversee the graduation of some 16, 361 youth in 15 affected municipalities.
“We have to plan this very well because we must not deny the children of their right to graduate from schooling despite the ongoing military operation against the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF),” Mangudadatu said in an interview during a Provincial Peace and Order Council (PPOC) on Friday this week.
At least 39 primary and secondary public schools were closed brought about by the running gun battles between state forces and pocket BIFF elements for nearly a month now in the province’s second district.
The governor added that another PPOC meeting would be held before a proposed March 25 – 27 suspension of military operations against the BIFF for them to be able to assess the overall peace and order situation in the area.
The Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao – Humanitarian Emergency Action and Response Team (ARMM-HEART), in coordination with the Maguindanao provincial office, had dispenses over 100 tons of relief goods to the evacuees since the last week of February.
Private organizations also had their share of donations to the displaced people that included the Ateneo de Davao University, Jaycees International; Aboitiz Corporation; and the Paglas Corporation (PagCorp) that runs the La Frutera and Unifrute firms in Paglas town of the province.
“You cannot help shed tears to the displaced families cramped under small makeshift tents lined along the roads of affected areas in the province,” Datu Abubakar Paglas, PagCorp chief executive, said during a recent relief mission in the town of Mamasapano, the center of the ongoing military-BIFF conflict.
While there, Paglas and his group managed to distribute 2,600 relief packs, which included kilos of rice each, to affected villagers.
Paglas said his hometown of Paglas, once a war-torn area, was able to “rise from ashes” after the setting in of government peace initiatives that led to the formation of the province’s leading banana firms La Frutera and Unifrute that is currently employing hundreds of locals mainly composed of former Moro rebels.
The affected areas in the province included the towns of Guindulungan, Datu Unsay, Datu Saudi, Shariff Saydona, Salibo, Mamasapano, Rajah Buayan, Datu Anggal Midtimbang, Datu Piang, Datu Abdullah Sangki, Datu Hoffer, Datu Odin Sinsuat, Talayan, Talitay and Shariff Aguak.
This developed as the ARMM made public the plan to replace the iconic wooden footbridge in Barangay Tukanalipao, Mamasapano, with a concrete Php 17-million bridge.
Out of the aggregated bridge allotment, ARMM Governor Mujiv Hataman said Php 7-million would be utilized for the bridge structure and Php 10-million for a one – kilometer cemented pavement from the village to the main highway in Mamasapano.
Hataman said the new bridge would symbolize the government’s unwavering quest for peace in Mindanao despite the Jan. 25 ill-fated mis-encounter in Mamasapano that claimed the lives of 44 members of the elite Special Action Force of the Philippine National Police (SAF-PNP); 18 Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels and six civilians fleeing from the clash site.
The SAF members were about to extract from the area following a dawn mission to get Malaysian bomb terrorist Zulkipli bir Hir alias Marwan and Maguindanaon cohort Basit Usman when an unexpected firefight erupted between them and BIFF bandits in the area.
A nearby MILF encampment heard the shots and later joined the fray after a three-way firefight ensued.
The SAF men managed to neutralize Marwan after the latter resisted arrest and engaged the team in a brief exchange of gunfire, but failed to get Usman who was in another location in the area.
Usman, reportedly being coddled by BIFF associates, is one of the major targets of the ongoing military law enforcement operation in Maguindanao. (PNA)