Sale of firecrackers banned during month of Ramadan

COTABATO CITY — The city government has banned the sale of powerful firecrackers, now sold in the streets, for the duration of the Ramadan season, which starts today to ensure its solemn observance in the 37 barangays here.

Muslims abstain from food, drink and sex from dawn to dusk during the Ramadan, which lasts for one lunar cycle, or 30 days.

"These powerful firecrackers can only disrupt the quite atmosphere we need when we do our reflections, prayers and fasting during the Ramadan," said Sema, secretary-general of the Moro National Liberation Front.

Since last week, the local police seized five huge boxes containing firecrackers in separate operations in keeping with the mayor’s directive.

Senior Superintendent Sangcala Dampac, city police director, said the city’s 20-member motorcycle patrol group is now patrolling the surroundings of all the worship sites here on round-the-clock basis to protect Muslims during their praying sessions in mosques.

Army Major Julieto Ando, spokesman of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said their commander, Major Gen. Generoso Senga, ordered yesterday all caretakers of mosques inside military camps in Central Mindanao to open the worship sites to public as part of the division’s confidence-building measures with Muslim communities.

"Even members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front can worship in these mosques as long as they would not bring in their firearms when they enter our camps," Ando said.

Ando said the Sallam Unit, a group of Muslim soldiers, some of them Islamic theologians, will supervise the division’s religious activities for Muslim communities in Central Mindanao during the Ramadan.

The observance of Ramadan is one of the so-called five pillars of the Islamic faith, which also include belief in Allah; giving of zakat, or alms to the poor, praying five times a day facing west, and performing the haj, or pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in a lifetime for those who can afford.

Children, lactating mothers, the sick and elderly are exempted from fasting during the Ramadan, also regarded as a time for mending misunderstandings among Muslims and their non-Muslim neighbors.