Native’s death delays CAR tribal peace talks

BAGUIO CITY — The natural death of a young Butbut villager in Bugnay, Tinglayan, Kalinga has delayed the scheduled peace talks between two warring tribes living on the contested common boundary of Kalinga and Mt. Province, both provinces of the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR).

After years of fighting over their common mountain boundary, the Butbuts and the Betwagans of Sadanga, Mt. Province signed a memorandum of understanding for a truce last May 20.

The formal peace talks were supposed to start June 14 but the Butbuts, true to their customs, declared a ngilin or a solemn mourning period for the death of the young villager. Tribe members are strictly prohibited from leaving the village during a ngilin.

Senior tribal folk warned that violating the solemnity of the community ngilin may result in greater misfortune, even if the out-of-town peace talks may finally end the conflict between the two tribes.

The Butbuts consider the death of a villager on the eve of the peace discussions as a bad omen, according to reports from the Mt. Province office of the Philippine Information Agency (PIA).

This explains why the Butbuts did not send any "authorized official representative" to the June 14 start of the talks.

Under the May 20 truce accord, each tribe agreed not to take animals owned by the other and to strictly prohibit timber poaching within the contested area, aside from keeping the truce until the peace pact is finally restored.

Furthermore, the Butbuts of Sitio Bugnay agreed not to enter the contested area. For their part, the Betwagans agreed not to encroach into the area, and into ricefields and communal land of the Bugnay tribe.

Despite the ngilin declared by the Butbut tribe, their local government leaders, Tinglayan councilors Pedro Abbacan and Basilio Daging, attended the peace dialogue as representatives of the Mansasakusak, which is composed of peace pact holders from various Kalinga tribes.