Army gets 5-hectare land for new Basilan camp

COTABATO CITY — The Lamitan City government on Tuesday donated to the Philippine Army a five-hectare land for a camp as part of its security and economic thrust for its 45 constituent barangays.

City officials told reporters on Wednesday that the initiative is parallel with the joint efforts of the Lamitan City local government unit, the office of Gov. Hadjiman Salliman and the Army’s 101st Infantry Brigade to boost the investment potentials of the island province of Basilan, now touted as the new investment hub of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

The five-hectare land where the Philippine Army is to put up a new camp is located in Sitio Mawagkit in Barangay Colonia, a mixed Muslim-Christian settlement existing since the Spanish colonial era.

Mayor Roderick Furigay personally turned over the title of the property to Major Gen. Domingo Gobway of the Philippine Army’s Installation Management Command during Wednesday’s symbolic rite at the Lamitan City LGU gymnasium.

The event was witnessed by Brig. Gen. Alvin Luzon, commander of the Army’s 101st Infantry Brigade, the now three termer Basilan governor Salliman and other city and provincial officials.

Wednesday’s donation to the Philippine Army of the five-hectare land in Barangay Colonia, for an Army camp, was first mulled by the administration of former Lamitan City Mayor Rose Furigay.

Gobway and the commander of the Philippine Army, Lt. Gen. Roy Galido, separately told reporters that they are thankful to the Lamitan City LGU for donating the five-hectare property with approval from members of the Sangguniang Panglungsod.

“We now have another good area in Basilan where to put a camp,” Gobway, who had served as commander of the 101st Infantry Brigade in Basilan, said.

Members of the business communities in BARMM, among them the lawyer-entrepreneur Ronald Hallid Torres, who is chairman of the Bangsamoro Business Council, said that the setting up of a large Army camp in Lamitan City is good for their efforts to show to outsider investors the viability now of setting up feasible capital-intensive income-earning ventures in its 45 barangays.

“Security is a paramount concern for us in the business sector and that is something that complements our initiatives for that to spread around Lamitan City and its surroundings,” Torres said.