Muslims protest raids on their communities

MALOLOS, Bulacan — Muslim leaders in Metro Manila and Mindanao called yesterday on the police and military to stop the "Al-Ghozi" raids on their communities.

Cosain Naga Jr., spokesman for Suara Bangsamoro (Voice of the Moro People), said in a statement the police and military are using Muslims as "scapegoats" so they could present to media "the culprits" in terrorist bombings and other violent incidents.

"The Moro people are so burdened with saturation drives and warrantless arrests imposed in their communities," he said.

"The Arroyo administration is using the hunt for the alleged terrorist to justify her abuse, but in the end resolving nothing about terrorism."

President Arroyo is using the hunt for convicted terrorist Fathur Rohman al-Ghozi, two Abu Sayyaf cohorts and the Davao bombers to "justify her abuse" of presidential powers, he added.

On the other hand, Amirah Ali Lidasan, secretary general of Moro-Christian People’s Alliance (MCPA), said the government’s "militarist policy" has been ineffective in resolving the terrorist bombings in Metro Manila and Mindanao.

"One by one, the flaws of the Arroyo administration’s policy of warrantless arrests in areas declared as ‘state of lawlessness’ and ‘lawless violence’ are slowly unraveling," she said.

Lidasan said this only means that warrantless arrests are ineffective tools to quell the terrorist hysteria and to resolve the terrorist bombings in Mindanao and Metro Manila.

They are only "prone to abuse" by police and military officials, she added.

The MCPA and Suara Bangsamoro called on the government to lift the "state of lawlessness" in their communities and to put a stop to the arbitrary arrest of Muslims, which they said was part of the government’s strategy to cover up its blunders.

Meanwhile, PNP spokesman Director Ricardo del Leon said the police is still hunting down Al-Ghozi.

"We have not stopped the hunt," he said. "Our tracker teams are still out there looking for him." – James Mananghaya, Mike Frialde