No pullout of Army troops from Buliok

CAMP SIONGCO, Maguindanao — Army and Marine combatants guarding the Buliok Complex, which the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) want returned to its control, started repositioning yesterday strategic spots in the 3,000-hectare former MILF enclave to secure more rehabilitation projects for local Muslim communities.

Maj. Gen. Generoso Senga, commander of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said that while the MILF is demanding the pull out of government security forces in the Buliok Complex, soldiers there will continue to guard critical sites where government projects are ongoing.

The complex, where former MILF chairman Hashim Salamat built a command headquarters after they were dislodged from Camp Abubakar in 2000, was overrun by soldiers in February last year after one week of fighting and has since been called a "peace zone" where various rehabilitation projects are being implemented.

Only last October, the Army’s 54th Engineering Brigade turned over almost a hundred low-cost houses to residents in the Buliok Complex as part of the government’s effort in fostering normalcy in the area.

Senga said several teams of Marines from the surroundings of Salamat’s former base had been reassigned to Bago Inged in Pikit to guard a Tulay ng Pangulo project that would link the area across a wide tributary of the Rio Grande de Mindanao to Pikit and Pagalungan.

Another group of Marines, according to Senga, had been scattered along secluded stretches of farm-to-market roads criss-crossing the Buliok Complex to secure local villagers and soldiers jointly rehabilitating roads destroyed by recent downpours and flashfloods.

"When the troops move around, it doesn’t mean that the areas they vacate would be turned over to the MILF. There is no such thing as a turn over of former rebel enclaves to the MILF," said Senga.

Senga has also allayed fears of Buliok residents of possible setbacks in the fragile peace in their communities if the government returns to MILF forces areas left by the Marines.

For two weeks now, tension has been high in Muslim villages in the Buliok Complex, spawned by stories circulating that Malacañang has agreed to the "gradual pullout" of troops from the area as a supposed concession to the MILF for agreeing to hold formal talks with the government.

The 6th ID and the 2nd Marine Brigade, which has jurisdiction over Marine units in the Buliok Complex, have since been receiving text messages from local officials and community leaders appealing for the retention of military forces in their villages.