AFP cites Basilan local government’s peace, security efforts

COTABATO CITY— Residents of Basilan province in the Bangsamoro region were elated over the grant it received from the Armed Forces of the Philippines on Thursday.

AFP gave the provincial government Pagkakaisa Award which was received by their now third-termer governor.

Basilan Gov. Hadjiman Salliman was the only local executive from among the recipients of the Pagkakaisa Award handed over by the AFP’s chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Romeo Brawner,Jr., during a symbolic rite at Camp Aguinaldo in Quezon City on Thursday. This was awarded in recognition of his administration’s support to the national government’s pacification efforts in the island province via local peace and security, humanitarian and community-empowerment projects.

The awarding rite was part of the celebration of the AFP’s 88th anniversary on Thursday, Brawner told reporters based in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao via text message on Friday morning.

“That award was, for us, a tap on our shoulder, an encouragement to continue supporting our provincial government’s domestic peace and reconciliation programs now changing the image of Basilan from a conflict-torn area into a new investment hub in BARMM,” Mayor Roderick Furigay of Lamitan City said on Friday.

The commander of the Philippine Army, Lt. Gen. Roy Galido, and Bangsamoro regional police director Brig. Gen. Allan Nobleza separately said on Friday that up to 429 members of the Abu Sayyaf terror group in Basilan had surrendered in batches, since 2016, and got reintegrated into the local communities through the efforts of the Basilan Provincial Police Office, the Army’s 101st Infantry Brigade, the 13-member provincial league of mayors and the office of Salliman.

Nobleza said that credit for the feat also has to go to the office of Basilan’s congressional representative, Mujiv Hataman, and the leaders of the Muslim and Christian religious leaders in the province for supporting the AFP and the Philippine National Police’s efforts to address violent religious extremism in all of the 11 towns and two cities in Basilan.

Maluso Mayor Hanie Bud, president of the mayor’s league in Basilan, said that they are happy with the AFP’s grant of the Pagkakaisa Award to Salliman.

“The Basilan provincial government, via its governor, deserves that award,” Galido told reporters in BARMM via Viber message on Friday morning.