Maguindanao's business climate fine despite Mamasapano carnage

MAGUINDANAO - The encounter between policemen and Moro rebels in Mamasapano, Maguindanao last January 25 that left 44 Special Action Force men dead, failed to dampen the investment climate in the province.

Provincial officials on Friday said a high-profile agricultural investment cooperation agreement was, in fact, forged by the wealthy Malaysian Naza Company and representatives of Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu in Malaysia two days after the incident.

The encounter, which left 44 policemen, 18 Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) guerillas and four civilians dead, shook the nation to its core.

Bai Sandra Siang, chairperson of the Muslim Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Kutawato, Inc., said their trading contacts abroad remained confident of the business climate in the province despite the incident.

“That confidence was even bolstered by their having read from news websites how the government and the MILF prevented escalation of hostilities and how both sides are doing everything to prevent that sad incident from affecting the Mindanao peace process,” Siang said.

Siang said most of their counterparts abroad with business interests in Cotabato City and Maguindanao have closely been monitoring the peace process.

“Actually many of them came in as the government-MILF negotiations gained headway in the past three years,” Siang said.

Siang said none of their contacts abroad signified intention of suspending their ongoing ventures in Maguindanao and surrounding provinces under Administrative Region 12 after the January 25 Mamasapano hostilities.

Provincial board member Bobby Katambak said he and other representatives of Mangudadatu signed in Malaysia a multi-million agricultural investment tie-up with the Malaysian Naza Company two days after the incident.

“That firm, which is a multi-national entity, will put up pineapple plantations in the neighboring North Upi and South Upi municipalities in the province,” Katambak said.

He said it was Mangudadatu who was supposed to sign the agreement in Malaysia, along with officials of the Malaysian agricultural outfit.

However, Katambak said the governor cancelled his January 25 flight to Kuala Lumpur after learning that firefights had erupted in three barangays in Mamasapano between members of the police’s elite and the MILF, and a third group, the outlawed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters.

“The incident did not affect the desire of the friends of Gov. Mangudadatu in Malaysia, a nation helping facilitate the government-MILF peace efforts, to invest in Maguindanao,” Katambak said.

Aside from helping push the government-MILF peace overture forward, Malaysia also leads the International Monitoring Team (IMT), which is observing since late 2003 the enforcement of a ceasefire pact between both sides covering flashpoint areas in Mindanao.

The IMT is comprised of soldiers from Malaysia, Brunei, Libya and Indonesia, and civilian economists and conflict resolution experts from Japan, Norway and the European Union.

A Chinese businessman in Cotabato City, who asked not to be identified, said the hostilities in Mamasapano could not even overtake all the gains and dividends of the GPH-MILF peace initiatives in the past five years.

“I would not call that incident a massacre as implied by others. I would call it `an accident,’ perhaps a providential accident that has to happen, by heaven’s design, for the peace process to get stronger and gain more momentum,” said the trader, who also has businesses in Gen. Santos City and South Cotabato.

Gov. Mujiv Hataman of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, an area which generated more than P3 billion worth of investments in the past two years, said none of his friends in the business communities in Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand have expressed apprehension on the safety of their projects in the ARMM.

It was Maguindanao, which has 36 towns that are all bastions of the MILF, which garnered the biggest share, about 70 percent, of the more than P3 billion worth of investments the ARMM generated in the past two years.

“Obviously their zeal is kept burning by the continuing Mindanao peace process, unaffected by the January 25 Mamasapano incident,” Hataman said.

Captain Jo-Ann Petinglay, spokesperson of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division in Maguindanao, said operations of the vast Cavendish banana and oil palm plantations in Maguindanao have not been affected by the SAF-MILF encounter in Mamasapano.

“It is business as usual. Everything is normal. Not one of these companies had asked for security details after the incident. That implies everything is normal, everything is under control,” Petinglay said.

Petinglay said the 6th ID is thankful to Hataman and Mangudadatu for helping resolve the incident peacefully via backchannel talks with MILF commanders and top members of the group’s central committee.

She said Mangudadatu has also been initiating backdoor dialogues with MILF commanders in Mamasapano to assure them that President Benigno Aquino III remains committed to the peace process despite the carnage.