Maguindanao del Norte town declared 'drug-free'

COTABATO CITY — An inter-agency regional committee has declared the seaside Datu Blah Sinsuat town in Maguindanao del Norte free from illegal drugs, further boosting its well-acknowledged stature as the most peaceful town in the province.

Datu Blah Sinsuat, covering 13 beachfront barangays, is also touted as Maguindanao del Norte's new investment hub, its coastline dotted with resorts frequented by beachgoers from provinces around and from Cotabato City, the capital of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

Gil Cesario Castro, director of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency-BARMM, told reporters on Thursday that Datu Blah Sinsuat was declared last Tuesday as “drug-cleared” by the Regional Oversight Committee on Barangay Drug Clearing, or ROCBDC, after a series of evaluation processes and deliberations by members in recent weeks.

The ROCBDC is composed of representatives from units of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, from peace advocacy blocs, and from other state law-enforcement agencies.

The mayor of Datu Blah Sinsuat, Marshall Sinsuat, said credit for their feat should go to members of their multi-sector Municipal Peace and Order Council, to the personnel the Datu Blah Sinsuat Municipal Police Station, to all of their barangay chairpersons, to the Army’s 6th Infantry Division and the Philippine Navy’s 1st Marine Brigade.

“The local communities have also been very supportive of our municipal anti-narcotics campaign and so we have this tag now as `drug-cleared’ municipality,” Sinsuat said.

Datu Blah Sinsuat is most known in the Bangsamoro region as the most peaceful municipality in Maguindanao del Norte, a description frequently emphasized by reporters of radio outfits in Central Mindanao each time it is mentioned in news reports.