108 Nur ‘loyalists’ end 3-year lam

CAMP SIONGCO, Maguin-danao — After three years on the run, 108 followers of jailed former Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) chairman Nur Misuari surrendered to the Army’s 6th Infantry Division the other day.

The Misuari "loyalists," led by Commander Abdulkadir Mindo, yielded more than a hundred firearms, including shoulder-fired M-79 grenade projectiles and pistols, during symbolic rites at the 6th ID headquarters here.

Since 2001, Mindo and his men went from one town to another to elude units of the 6th ID pursuing members of the so-called "Misuari renegade group."

They went underground following Misuari’s ouster as governor of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao in 2001.

Mindo said he and his followers decided to surrender to avail themselves of the government’s reconciliation program through the joint efforts of Maj. Gen. Generoso Senga, 6th ID commander, and Capt. Samier Bakuludan, chief of the 6th ID’s Sallam (Peace) Unit.

"We were made to understand that life will always be hard for us if we don’t come out and avail ourselves of Malacañang’s reconciliation program," Mindo said in the vernacular.

Mindo’s group received from Senga and Bakuludan an initial cash grant of P267,500 for the firearms that they turned in. — John Unson