Heavy rains fail to dampen Eid al-Fitr festivities

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – Heavy rains in many parts of Mindanao’s Muslim-dominated provinces did not dampen yesterday’s Eid al-Fitr festivities, as revelers paraded in the streets, and car horns and sirens blared to highlight the end of Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting.

Islamic preachers in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), home to some four million Muslims, appealed for support to the peace process and the peaceful resolution of the decades-old Moro rebellion during their khutab (sermons) in congregational prayers.

Eid al-Fitr marks the end of Ramadan, a holy month for Muslims, where they fast from dawn to dusk, focus on good deeds and reparations for wrongdoings, as a religious obligation meant to inculcate among them the importance of self-restraint to achieve spiritual perfection.

In his official Ramadan statement, ARMM Gov. Datu Zaldy Ampatuan, who has administrative jurisdiction over five provincial governors and 117 mayors – two of whom are Christians – thanked the national government and all foreign donors involved in peace-building activities in the region.

Ampatuan said the national government has been very active in helping sustain the operations of the ARMM’s Madaris Education, which has more than 500 moderate Islamic missionaries teaching peace education and Islamic values focused on religious solidarity and peaceful resolution of conflicts in far-flung communities in the region.

“The most sensible way of propagating peace and progress in troubled areas in Mindanao is to promote religious and political solidarity and socio-economic cooperation among its Muslim and Christian communities. Such initiative is non-violent and will thus usher in peace among us,” he said.

People in the autonomous region had a peaceful Ramadan as a consequence of last July’s separate suspension of military actions by President Arroyo and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Ampatuan said.

In a text message, Tawi-Tawi Gov. Hadji Sadikul Sahali said: “Our observance of the Ramadan, for one lunar cycle, intensified our resolve to continue struggling for the attainment of lasting peace and development in our homeland, the autonomous region.”

Imam Ismael Ebrahim, a guest writer of the Mindanao Cross, a weekly Catholic newspaper here, said Muslims “feel so energized” after fasting for about 28 days.

“It’s like a rebirth,” he said.

“It is by observing the Ramadan according to the teachings of Islam that we purify ourselves and renew our commitment to always believe in Allah and be at peace with our neighbors, regardless of whether they are Muslims or non-Muslims.”

Superintendent Danilo Bacas, ARMM police spokesman, said more than 20 violent family feuds, or rido, have been settled amicably by regional police officials led by Chief Supeintendent Paisal Umpa just as Muslims in the region started winding up their observance of the Ramadan.

“The protagonists in those different clan wars readily agreed to reconcile with each other when they were requested to do so at a time when they were observing the Ramadan,” he said.

Muslims believe it was during the Ramadan when the Qur’an was sent down by Allah to the Prophet Mohammad, an orphaned and illiterate Arab shepherd, to be used as basis in propagating Islam, which literally means “peace.”

Islamic history books have stories on how Mohammad and his poorly equipped Army won battles during Ramadan against kingdoms in the ancient Arabian desert that attempted to stop them from practicing what was then a new form of religion.

Pagan Arabs found Islam strange and totally against their practices of slavery, usury and worship of idols.  

Among the greatest military feats of Mohammad and his more than 300 soldiers was the Battle of Bader, which also occurred during Ramadan, where they defeated a large pagan militia from what are now the independent states of Syria, Jordan and Lebanon.