By SITTIE SUNDANG
Bulatlat.com
DATU PIANG, Maguindanao- Internally displaced persons (IDPs) or “bakwits” have chosen to stay at the evacuation centers despite declarations of a suspension of offensive military operations (Somo) and a suspension of military actions (Soma) by the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), respectively.
Kabiba Mohammad, an IDP leader sheltering at the Datu Gumbay Piang Elementary School in Datu Piang, Maguindanao, said they are still hesitant about going back to their homes origin despite the Somo and Soma declarations because soldiers are still present in their communities.
She said they are worried that while in their homes they might be caught in the middle of new exchanges of fire. “It is better to be safe than to go home without assurance of our safety,” she said.
These IDPs have been expressing their willingness to return to their communities but they remain hesitant until there are more concrete manifestations of security and stability. The Somo and Soma declarations do not motivate them very much to return home.
Ghazali Jaafar, MILF chairman for political affairs, said in a local television interview in Cotabato City that even his group does not recommend that the IDPs go back to their communities, especially since the military’s Somo declaration does not cover the MILF’s so-called “rogue commanders”. even them cannot recommend to IDPs to go back home since the military troops are still visible in communities in Maguindanao given that the declaration of SOMO does not cover MILF’s ‘rogue’ commanders thus the pursuit operations continue.
The pursuit operations against the MILF’s commanders Abdullah Macapaar alias Commander Bravo in Lanao del Norte, Ustadz Ameril Ombra Cato in North Cotabato and Ustadz Alim Pangalian in Maguindanao started in August last year.
Presently, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) reported 52,300 families sheltering at the displacement sites in Maguindanao and 62,010 IDP families in entire Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). However, there are IDPs especially in Datu Piang who are complaining about the figures because, they said, some of them were not included in the list of DSWD-ARMM notwithstanding the fact that they are still at the evacuation centers.
These IDPs have been displaced since July 2008 and since then, this has been their second time to observe Ramadan away from home.
Some of them have gone through several repairs of their temporary shelters, which are actually shanties with roofs of either tarpaulin or coconut leaves. This is to avoid flood, heavy rains and winds, and severe heat.
Sammy Duma, one of the IDPs sheltering beside the municipal library of Datu Piang, said they will return home only when there is no more fighting. He said that last Sept. 3, the municipal government advised them that they would be transferred to another evacuation center anytime soon.
Duma and his family were displaced from their community in Barangay (village) Damatulan, Midsayap, North Cotabato on Aug. 22, 2008.
He said although they are longing to go back to their places of origin, some of them cannot go back home because aside from the military presence, they have no houses to return to and no livelihood to start earning their keep anew with as these were devastated due to the intensified fighting. Bulatlat.com
