Hiked violence in ARMM seen as b’gay polls near

COTABATO CITY – A rash of violence among feuding families in certain hostile areas of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao is feared to escalate with the approach of the July 15 synchronized barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections.

Records obtained by The STAR from the Commission on Elections showed that 90 percent of candidates for barangay chairmen in the ARMM’s constituent areas – Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi, Basilan and Marawi City – belong to big Muslim families, some of them locked in decades-old clan wars.

"These families are bent on putting in place their anointed bets for barangay chairmen in preparation for the 2004 local and national elections," said a directorate staff of the ARMM’s Department of Interior and Local Government.

Majority of candidates for SK chairmen and kagawads in ARMM towns, are either children or siblings of incumbent public officials.

Last week, suspected partisans raided a remote barangay in Kabuntalan, a secluded town in Maguindanao, and raked with automatic weapons a house of a candidate for barangay chairman in the area.

Responding soldiers and civilian volunteers returned fire, killing one of the attackers and wounding three others.

In Maguindanao, some mayors initiated prior consultations with residents in hostile communities within their respective jurisdictions on common candidates for barangay chairmen and kagawads.

The mayors had succeeded in convincing rival clans to have only one common, unopposed candidate for barangay chairmen and in the "equitable representation and sharing" in the slots for kagawads.

"This is a good way of preventing our constituents from fighting over the elective positions in their barangay governments. It is only a matter of building consensus among themselves, with the help of the police, the military and their mayors for them to help one another in making the barangay elections a very sensible exercise," said Datu Tucao Mastura, mayor of Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao.

Mastura, who is feared for his "eye-for-an-eye, tooth-for-a-tooth" policy in maintaining peace and order in his hometown, said influential Muslim religious leaders also have a big role in ensuring peaceful barangay elections.

Meanwhile, a barangay captain in Barangay Kahayagan Carmen, Agusan del Norte was shot dead while campaigning in Sitio Lagaylay of said barangay by still unidentified three gunmen at about 5:30 p.m. last Friday.

Police identified the victim as Barangay Captain Amado Palisan, 47, a former policeman.

Palisan died on the spot. As this developed, Agusan del Norte Police Provincial Director Senior Supt. Edgar Agustin has increased the number of election hot spot to seven among 276 barangays of the province. – With Ben Serrano