North Cotabato Governor Emmanuel Piñol, chairman of the provincial peace and order council, said the SAF contingent will secure strategic spots in the periphery of the Buliok Complex where socio-economic projects for local members of the MILF are being implemented.
"The deployment of a SAF unit in Buliok is enough assurance to the local sectors that government forces will never vacate the area, which was once a haven of MILF forces," said Piñol, who is strongly opposed to the return of rebel forces in the former guerrilla enclave.
The 3,000-hectare Buliok Complex, located at the boundary of this town and Pagalungan, Maguindanao, was liberated from joint occupation by the MILF and gangs identified with the Pentagon kidnapping syndicate in February last year after a week-long air, artillery and ground offensive.
Piñol, along with Major General Generoso Senga of the 6th Infantry Division, Col. Mohammad Ben Dolorfino of the 2nd Marine Brigade and Pikit Mayor Farida Malingco, turned over on Sunday 22 brand new farm tractors to barangay officials in communities around the Buliok Complex as part of the effort to enhance productivity of local farmers.
The distribution of the diesel tractors, which cost P33 million, capped Sunday’s launching of the provincial government’s "plow and plant now, pay later" program for local farmers.
The program, according to Piñol, would grant seed and fertilizer loans to local farmers and MILF members so they can have enough agricultural inputs at the start of the corn cropping season next month.
Dolorfino, who has jurisdiction over two Marine battalions here, said local commanders of the MILF has asked the 2nd Marine Brigade to help them avail of the "plow and plant now pay later" program.
"All they want is to have better livelihood opportunities so they can start life all over again and live peacefully as productive citizens in their villages in the periphery of the Buliok Complex," Dolorfino said.
Imam Abdurahman Piang, a mufti (grand preacher) in this town, told Senga and Dolorfino he would encourage farmers and local MILF forces to write a common request for the government to energize their farming communities.
"In return we will guarantee the safety of power transmission facilities and the power lines that would traverse our farms so that our villages will have electricity," Piang said in the Maguindanaon dialect.