BULUAN, Maguindanao,
Philippines — Groups allied with the Islamic State (IS) continue to recruit
young Moros, luring them with at least P50,000 outright cash and a P10,000
monthly allowance, a top police official said on Sunday. Col. Arnold Santiago,
chief of the Maguindanao Police Provincial Office, made the disclosure
following last week’s clash between the IS-linked Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom
Fighters (BIFF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
Seven MILF fighters
were killed in the four-hour clash on Oct. 3 at Barangay Dasawao in Shariff
Saydona Mustapha town. The village is the birthplace of Esmael Abubakar, alias
Kumander Bungos, leader of one of three BIFF factions, Santiago said. BIFF
members have been especially targeting the young, out-of-school Moros to take
up arms, Santiago said in a telephone interview. “They are offered cash to
become IS fighters,” he said.
The recruits, he said,
were being indoctrinated with the wrong teachings of Islam, including violence.
The Oct. 3 clash erupted after BIFF men under Abubakar went to the
MILF-controlled village, brandishing their high-powered firearms. According to
Santiago, fighters from the BIFF and the MILF have a longstanding “rido” (clan
war) due to a land dispute. The MILF, he said, had long requested BIFF members,
who are related to its members, to avoid visiting Barangay Dasawao while
carrying high-powered weapons, as this could trigger a gun battle that could
result in civilian displacement.
Santiago also said
that once the presence of BIFF fighters was detected in the community,
government forces would launch military operations in the area, which would
send residents fleeing to safety.
Foreign fighters
Rommel Banlaoi, chair
of the Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence and Terrorism Research, earlier
told the Inquirer that foreign IS fighters were still going to Mindanao despite
their defeat in Marawi City in 2017, to help local militant groups establish a
caliphate in Southeast Asia. Armed men belonging to the Maute Group, which had
pledged allegiance to the IS, laid siege to Marawi in 2017. Government forces
engaged them in a five-month battle that ended with the killing of the group’s
leaders, brothers Omar and Abdullah Maute, and their top lieutenants.
Banlaoi said the
foreign fighters monitored to have entered Mindanao came from Saudi Arabia,
Turkey, Morocco, Spain, France, Tunisia, Iraq, Somalia, Egypt, Yemen, Libya,
Pakistan, Bangladesh and China. But the bulk came from Indonesia and Malaysia,
which both share maritime borders with the Philippines.
Home base
“The [foreign
fighters] regard Mindanao as the new land of jihad (fight against enemies of
Islam), safe haven and alternative home base,” Banlaoi said. To counter IS
recruitment, Santiago said the Maguindanao police had been sending
representatives to talk at the ‘madaris’ (Islamic schools) or with the ‘ustadz’
(religious scholar) to propagate the “true essence of Islam” as a religion of
peace. For Muslims in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, the
real war “is the war to eradicate poverty and hunger,” he said.
Sumber:
Inquirer.net - 07 OKT 2019
Oleh: Bong Sarmiento
Oleh: Bong Sarmiento
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