Neglected Maguindanao tribal enclave benefit from HELPS project

COTABATO CITY, Philippines - Manobo-Dulangan chieftain Mario Kadingilan and hundreds of his followers did not sleep the night before, as they anxiously waited for Tuesday morning’s launching of a special humanitarian project in their barangay that has never been visited by any government official since its creation in 1973.

Kadingilan, who belongs to the Manobo-Dulangan nobility, is the incumbent chairman of Barangay Tubak in Ampatuan town in the second district of Maguindanao, touted as the “remotest barangay” in Central Mindanao.

Kadingilan shed what he called “tears of joy,” before reporters and his constituents, among them ethnic Tedurays and Christian settlers, after having been told by visiting public officials that their tribal enclave has been chosen as a site for a special services convergence project of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and the provincial government of Maguindanao.

The project, dubbed as “ARMM-HELPS” or Health, Education, Livelihood, and Peace and Security interventions, aims to address poverty and underdevelopment in recipient communities through direct visitations by provincial and regional officials tasked to address domestic community concerns.

The project has been launched in selected impoverished areas in the ARMM provinces of Lanao del Sur, Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi, in earlier symbolic rites participated by local executives and representatives of civil society organizations.

“We have never seen any high official visit us since the creation of our barangay in 1973. I’m 33 years old now and have not seen a single public official come here. My elders have not seen anyone come here for a good purpose either,” an emotional Kadingilan said in a message during the launching of the ARMM-HELPS, in between sobs, as he paused repeatedly to wipe off his tears.

The program's launching was jointly officiated by ARMM Gov. Mujiv Hataman and Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu.

Mangudadatu committed to help pay for the salaries of three volunteer teachers handling classes for Manobo-Dulangan primary schoolchildren, after learning from Kadingilan that their three local mentors are paid only out of their barangay government’s meager operating funds.

Hataman and Mangudadatu both said that the ARMM-HELPS is in support of President Benigno Aquino III’s peace and development initiatives for underdeveloped communities in the autonomous region to complement the socio-economic components of Malacañang’s peace talks with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.

Hataman also assured to work out the enlistment of at least two of the three volunteer teachers by the ARMM’s Department of Education.

Barangay Tubak is almost three hours overland from Esperanza town in Sultan Kudarat, through narrow roads at the sides of rugged, densely forested mountains.

The provincial government of Maguindanao had earlier rehabilitated portions of the road linking Barangay Tubak to Esperanza, a major trading area.

Hataman, in a dialogue with Tubak’s mixed indigenous people and Christian settlers, gave out mobile phone numbers of regional secretaries involved in managing the ARMM-HELPS project in the area.

“If you have concerns, you can send them text messages. If they don’t reply, let me know so I can order them to act on your concerns,” said Hataman, who also gave out his cellphone number to the villagers.

'Cash-for-work'

Mangudadatu and Hataman also gave out “cash-for-work” to tribesmen enlisted to help in various community improvements under the ARMM-HELPS.

The ARMM’s regional health secretary, physician Kadil Sinolinding Jr., and Mangudadatu’s chief budget officer, Lynette Estandarte, also provided medicines to sick Tubak villagers and fed more than a hundred children with high-nutrient foods.

Kadingilan told reporters that he and his culturally-diverse Manobo-Dulungan, Teduray and Christian constituents were also grateful to the provincial government and to ARMM’s social welfare department for organizing their elders into a senior citizens' group the HELPS project is to serve extensively.

Kadingilan said that what fascinated them most with the launching of the ARMM-HELPS was its seeming connection with an ancient lore which says all of Central Mindanao’s highland, non-Moro indigenous communities, and the Moro people in the lower areas and the marshlands in the region descended from blood brothers Mamalu and Tabunaway.

Apart from Hataman, who is a Yakan from Basilan, almost all of the officials that visited Tubak to launch ARMM-HELPS were Moro Maguindanaons, or those that descended from the Tabunaway ancestry.

History has it that Tabunaway embraced Islam when an Arab-Malay prince from Johore, Sharif Mohammad Kabunsuan, arrived in what is now Cotabato City in the 14th century to preach Islam, while Mamalu decided to remain a non-Muslim, and continue practicing their centuries-old customs and traditions.

Mamalu was said to have resettled, along with his followers in the hinterlands of Maguindanao, while other relatives built new mountain enclaves in what are now highland towns in North Cotabato and Bukidnon, to freely enable the pagan-turned Muslim Tabunaway to build a community of his own in the Kutawato area, which comprises Cotabato City and surrounding towns in what is now first district of Maguindanao.

Before the siblings Mamalu and Tabunaway parted ways, they were said to have pledged to each other never to become adversaries and even help one another protect their common interests, particularly in preserving their respective ancestral domains as “abodes of peace” and as sanctuaries for oppressed people, regardless of religion and ethnic origin.