Autonomous Region Muslim Mindanao News February 2014

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Autonomous Region Muslim Mindanao Archived News
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Wars of ancient history were about possessions, territory, power, control, family, betrayal, lover's quarrel, politics and sometimes religion.

But we are in the Modern era and supposedly more educated and enlightened .

Think about this. Don't just brush off these questions.

  • Why is RELIGION still involved in WARS? Isn't religion supposed to be about PEACE?
  • Ask yourself; What religion always campaign to have its religious laws be accepted as government laws, always involved in wars and consistently causing WARS, yet insists that it's a religion of peace?

WHY??

There are only two kinds of people who teach tolerance:
  1. The Bullies. They want you to tolerate them so they can continue to maliciously deprive you. Do not believe these bullies teaching tolerance, saying that it’s the path to prevent hatred and prejudice.
  2. The victims who are waiting for the right moment to retaliate. They can’t win yet, so they tolerate.

ARMM HEART provides relief to IDPs in Maguindanao

By Oliver Ross V. Rivera (ORVRivera-PIA12/BPI-ARMM)

COTABATO CITY, Feb. 10 (PIA) – Thousands of internally displaced persons received relief assistance and free medical services from the ARMM government last week.

Around 758 families comprised of 3,790 individuals from the village of Macasendeg in Midsayap, North Cotabato benefit from the services of the joint team of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Humanitarian Emergency Action and Response Team (ARMM-HEART) and the Army's 6th Infantry Division.

The individuals are originally from the village of Dasawao in Shariff Saydona, Maguindanao but were forced to flee their homes due to the clashes between government troops and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighter (BIFF).

One of those displaced, farmer Racman Gandi, 48, said his family is willing to go back to their home in Dasawao when the fighting stops and government officials can guarantee their safety.

“Pagod na kami sa gulong ito, sana matapos na (We’re tired of this conflict),” he said.

Gandi said the relief from the ARMM government will help them get by the hardship of life in the evacuation center.

Aside from the relief goods and medical service, evacuees were also able to get free haircut.

Laisa Alamia, ARMM executive secretary, said ARMM HEART targets to cater all affected families at identified evacuation sites.

She said similar relief operations will be conducted at other evacuation sites in the days ahead.

“We like to let these displaced families feel that they are being neglected by the government,” she said.

President Aquino seeks support from local leaders to achieve peace in Mindanao

By Azer N. Parrocha [(PNA), CTB/NYP/]

MANILA, Feb 9 (PNA) -- President Benigno S. Aquino III will seek the support of local leaders in achieving peace in Mindanao in the upcoming Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) local government summit.

Presidential Communications Operations Office Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said on state-run dzRB Radyo ng Bayan that the President wants the leaders in ARMM to unite and help the peace process.

“...Sana’y humantong na (ito) doon sa pagtatatag ng Bangsamoro political entity, kapag ito ay inaprubahan ng mga mamamayan sa isang plebisito at naitatag na rin ang Bangsamoro transitional authority,” Coloma said.

(“We hope this will lead to the establishment of the Bangsamoro political entity should the people approve it in a plebiscite,” he said.)

The Bangsamoro political entity is being eyed to replace the ARMM. It has been discussed peace talks between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

Coloma also noted that with ARMM now part of a transition, the local government officials should help maintain peace and order.

"At aalamin din po ng Pangulo kung mayroong mga iba pang mahalagang usapin na local concerns ang mga local executives sa ARMM para matiyak na tumutugon ang pambansang pamahalaan sa kanilang mga pangangailangan,” he added.

“The President also wants to know if the local executives have concerns that the national government need to address," he added.

Roxas, Deles lead inauguration of BTC office in Cotabato

By Noel Y. Punzalan [(PNA), CTB/NYP/]

COTABATO CITY, Feb. 8 (PNA) – - Department of Interior and Local Government secretary Mar Roxas and Office of the Presidential Assistant on the Peace Process secretary Teresita Deles led here Saturday the opening of the Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC) office along Magallanes St., the city’s commercial district.

Before proceeding to the BTC office inauguration, both officials first made a quick stop at the Bishop’s Palace on Sinsuat Avenue to visit Orlando Cardinal Quevedo, the first prelate from Mindanao elevated to the College of Cardinals by the Vatican.

The opening of the BTC office created a monstrous traffic in the downtown area for several hours as vehicles plying the commercial district were made to redirect their trips to other thoroughfares of the city.

Also in attendance in the opening ceremony were Moro Islamic Liberation Front peace panel chair-cum- BTC head Mohagher Iqbal, Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Governor Mujiv Hataman and Maguindanao Governor Esmael Mangudadatu, among others.

The BTC was earlier formed to draft provisions of the Bangsamoro Basic Law that would pave the way for the creation of the Bangsamoro entity, which would replace the old, graft-ridden ARMM set-up.

Maguindanao town evacuees get more relief packs

By John Unson (philstar.com)

MAGUINDANAO, Philippines -- The Humanitarian Emergency and Relief Assistance Team (HEART) in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao distributed on Friday 2,450 more relief packs to evacuees dislocated by last week’s hostilities in the province between the military and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters.

ARMM Regional Executive Secretary Laisa Alamia, who is helping oversee the HEART, said the relief goods were dispersed to internally displaced people (IDPs) in Maguindanao’s adjoining Salibo and Shariff Saidona towns by volunteers led by the region’s social welfare secretary, Haroun Al-Rashid Lucman.

Representatives from the office of Lucman, who is also the ARMM’s incumbent regional vice governor, and HEART volunteers facilitated early this week the dispersal of more than 5,000 relief packs to evacuees in the towns of Datu Piang, Mamasapano, and Guindulungan, all in Maguindanao.

Each relief pack is comprised of rice, canned goods, instant noodles and other vital food provisions.

There are thousands of IDPs cramped in squalid makeshift relief sites in Datu Piang, Mamasapano, and in Guindulungan, driven away from their homes by the five-day skirmishes between soldiers and members of the BIFF.

Alamia said the HEART, which is under the ministerial control of ARMM Gov. Mujiv Hataman, will continue to attend to the needs of the evacuees until they have returned to their homes.

Alamia said the Army’s 6th Infantry Division and its component brigades have been helping in the HEART’s relief and rehabilitation efforts in the towns affected by the recent BIFF-Army skirmishes.

Soldiers, led by Col. Edgar Gonzales and Brig. Gen. Edmund Pangilinan, commanding officers of the Army’s 1st Mechanized, and 601st Brigades, respectively, hoisted the Philippine flag February 1 at the BIFF’s main enclave in Barangay Ganta in Shariff Saidona, which fell after five days of assault.

Maguindanao village is first recipient of barangay-based SWM program in ARMM

(PNA), LAM/NYP

DATU SAUDI AMPATUAN, Maguindanao, Feb. 6 (PNA) -- A barangay here is now a recipient of a Solid Waste Management (SWM) program, after villagers themselves requested environment officials to rid their place of “smelly” rubbish brought about by wanton dumping of garbage.

On Wednesday, Department of Environment and Natural Resources–Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (DENR-ARMM) Secretary Kahal Kedtag led the conduct of a SWM seminar in Barangay Elian here in the hope of introducing the barangay-based eco-waste management scheme across the region.

“To note, Elian is the only village to date in the ARMM that availed of the barangay level SWM program, Kedtag said.

Kedtag said the village is also a recipient from them of a mini-garbage dump truck, 200 toilet bowls and trashcans for proper waste management.

He said the village is badly in need of toilets, with villagers mostly using open pit latrines at the back of their houses for their privy needs.

The SWM program in Elian also comes with the establishment of a Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) designed to receive, sort, process, and store compostable and recyclable materials in an environmentally sound manner.

Kedtag said his office is in the thick of launching the SWM program region wide with only the towns of Wao in Lanao del Sur and North Upi in Maguindanao so far employing the system.

Apart from Lanao del Sur and Maguindanao, other province components of the ARMM Sulu, Tawi-tawi and Basilan.

Mindanao IPs bat for conclusion of peace talks

By John Unson (philstar.com)

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – Mindanao’s indigenous non-Moro communities are looking forward to a positive conclusion to the now 17-year peace talks between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, tribal leaders said Wednesday.

Bae Magdalena Suhat Herbilla, presiding chairperson of the Council of Elders of the Federation of Matigsalog-Manobo Tribal Council (FEMMATRIC) and Habbas Camendan, deputy chair of the Mindanao Peoples Peace Movement (MPPM), both said in an emailed statement that their respective groups have also been very supportive of the government’s peace overture with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

Herbilla and Camendan are both duly acknowledged traditional leaders of the indigenous people (IP) in Central Mindanao.

“The Lumads do not want to experience war again and our fervent wish now is for peace to reign, which we firmly believe can be ushered in by the upcoming GPH-MILF peace agreement. Then we shall continue to thrive in peace in our tribal homelands,” Herbilla.

The FEMMATRIC has about 35,000 members scattered in IP ancestral lands in the adjoining North Cotabato and Bukidnon provinces.

Herbilla said they are confident any final peace deal between the government and the MILF will bolster the socio-economic, political and ancestral rights of highland non-Moro communities, which are, for now, protected by the Republic Act 837, also known as the Philippine Indigenous Peoples Rights Act of 1997.

Camendan has allayed fears of possible dislocation by lumad communities when the MILF assumes control of the Bangsamoro political entity the rebel group and the government aims to establish to replace the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao before the term of incumbent ARMM officials end on June 30, 2016.

“We are also certain that there is no truth to stories spreading that the lumad communities will bear arms and resort to rebellion if the government and the MILF will forge a final peace agreement that could marginalize our political, cultural and traditional statures,” Camendan said.

Camendan said there are tribal leaders that have either joined, or have become supporters of the MILF even before the formal GPH-MILF talks started on Jan. 7, 1997.

Camendan said he and his followers are convinced that the final peace deal between the GPH and the MILF, expected to be signed in two months, is inclusive in nature and will not discriminate the Christians and Lumads in the proposed Bangsamoro territory.

Marawi City to host 2014 ARMM reg’l sports meet

By Apipa P. Bagumbaran (APB/PIA-10)

MARAWI CITY, Lanao del Sur, Feb. 4 (PIA) --- Marawi City, the lone Islamic city in the country, will play host to this year’s Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Athletic Association (ARMMAA) meet, popularly known as Palarong ARMMAA.

The regional sports meet will run from February 10 to February 15 with the theme “Bridging Gaps: Towards Unity, Through Sports”, said Marawi City School Division Superintendent Mona Macatanong during the airing of Philippine Information Agency (PIA) Ozor ka, Ranao! radio program Monday, February 3.

She said they are expecting some 7,000 athletes, coaches and education officials coming from the nine schools division in the autonomous region to gather for the Palarong ARMMAA.

ARMM comprises of the provinces of Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi including the cities of Lamitan and Marawi.

Macatanong said the holding of the weeklong sports event here will not only showcase the athletic skills of ARMM students but will also the tourism potential of the city.

“It will also boost or create economic opportunities in the city as well as show that Marawi is indeed a peaceful city,” she further said.

ARMM joins the World Hijab Day celebration

(Bureau of Public Information-ARMM/PIA-10)

MARAWI CITY, Lanao del Sur, Feb. 3 (PIA) --- Government workers in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) including officials gathered Saturday morning, February 1, at the region’s seat to join people from across the globe in celebrating the World Hijab Day.

The women, regardless their religious affiliation, wore hijab in show of support to Muslim women who, by choice, don the hijab or any other prescribed dress for them.

Now on its second year, the World Hijab Day is observed in more than 50 countries worldwide to help end discrimination against Muslim women who wear hijab. It was espoused by Nazma Khan, a Bangladeshi-American woman who thought of encouraging women from all over, especially the non-Muslims, to wear hijab for a day to foster religious understanding and tolerance.

The ARMM government organized a fun run and a seminar to highlight the celebration. All women participants were encouraged to wear hijab.

Delsa Culango, a non-Muslim employee, said she supports Muslim women who wear the hijab particularly those who do it by choice.

“We should respect, and not discriminate, people for what they believe,” she said.

Sitti Djalia Hataman, Anak-Mindanao Partylist representative, is one of the advocates of the World Hijab Day in the country.

Hataman, herself a hijabi, said she knows by experience what it’s like to be discriminated for wearing hijab and for being a Muslim.

At a seminar on hijab and discrimination arranged by the ARMM’s Department of Tourism, Hataman brought the audience to tears as she narrated some of her personal experience and told them “marami mang diskriminasyon ang dumating, magsusuot ako ng hijab at hindi ko ikakahiyang Muslim ako.”

Military ends hunt vs Muslim rebels after capture of camps

By Rene Acosta

THE military ended on Sunday its operations against members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) in Central Mindanao after capturing the bandits’ four camps and assembly plant for homemade bombs.

The soldiers also reportedly killed 52 BIFF members, which included children. The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) added 49 of the BIFF guerrillas were wounded during the six-day military operations that began days after the government announced a peace deal is nearing approval.

The military said on Sunday that elements of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division seized four BIFF camps and a bomb-making factory at Barangay Ganta, Shariff Saydona Mustapha, during the fighting.

The bomb factory was responsible for the production of improvised explosive devices used in bombings in Central Mindanao, the AFP said.

The AFP added that the BIFF has been a constant threat in the ongoing peace negotiations between the government and the MILF.

“Many of BIFF’s members have standing warrants of arrest and their prolonged evasion will pose threats in communities where the BIFF is contained,” a statement issued by the AFP said.

“The AFP’s support operations will contribute to the successful arrest of target personalities who continue to be a threat to the peace and stability of communities in Maguindanao and neighboring provinces.”

On the side of the government, at least 20 soldiers were wounded while another one was killed. Eight civilians caught in the crossfire were wounded, the military reported on February 2.

The termination of the operations came as the 3-day extension for the military to continue serving warrants of arrest against wanted members of the BIFF lapsed on Sunday.

The warrants of arrest were granted by the Joint Ad Hoc Joint Action Group of the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). The MILF and the government announced last week that they are nearing to seal a deal for a peace agreement.

With the end of the operations, the affected civilians numbering at least 35,334 from the towns of Sharif Saydona, Rajah Buayan, Datu Piang all of Maguindanao and Pikit in North Cotabato, can now return to their homes, the military said.

The military operation that began on January 27 centered in several areas in the provinces of Maguindanao and North Cotabato.

The skirmishes between soldiers and the BIFF began after bandits ambushed a team of policemen and Philippine Army troops on its way to serve warrants against BIFF members in Pikit, North Cotabato and Sultan in Barongis, Maguindanao.

The fighting spread to other areas in the towns of Shariff Saidona Mustapha, Datu Piang and Rajah Buayan in Maguindanao.

Palace condemns IED attack, use of minors by armed group in Mindanao

(PNA), SCS/PCOO/RSM

MANILA, Feb. 1 (PNA) -- Malacañang on Saturday condemned the use of an improvised explosive device and so-called child warriors by armed groups fighting the government in Mindanao.

Deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte also urged the media to coordinate with officials on the ground especially in areas where fighting is likely to take place.

"Hindi maganda ang balitang yan at hindi tayo natutuwa (What happened on Saturday morning was not good and we are not amused)," she said on state-run dzRB Radyo ng Bayan.

Initial reports of Saturday's incident showed at least six people, including two journalists, were injured in an IED explosion in Maguindanao.

The military does not discount the possibility the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters, a breakaway group of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, could be behind the attack.

Valte appealed to media agencies to abide by a safety protocol and to cooperate with government representatives, including those of the police and the military, especially in controlled areas.

Meanwhile, Valte said the Palace is quite disturbed by the discovery of the remains of three child soldiers in one of the areas where fighting between the BIFF and government troops took place.

"Kahindik-hindik ang balita na may ginagamit silang child soldiers, beyond the fact that it violates so many laws, not just ours but of international laws. We condemn the practice of using child soldiers...Walang lugar ang paggamit ng menor de edad sa ganitong labanan (We are outraged that this group used child soldiers. This violates not just our laws but international laws as well. We condemn the practice of using child soldiers. Minors have no place in the battlefield)," she said.

She said the government can help address the situation through child support services, as well as the commitment of its security forces that they will not use child soldiers or warriors.

But she also appealed to parents to make sure their children are not recruited for such exploitation.

"Sa mga magulang, pakiusap natin, sana huwag nilang payagan ang kanilang mga anak na magamit sila sa ganitong paraan (We appeal to parents not to allow their children to be exploited this way)," she said.

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