Alamara militia in Talaingod blocks lumads from Salugpungan rites

From InterAksyon (Sep 28): Alamara militia in Talaingod blocks lumads from Salugpungan rites



Manobo school in Talaingod, Davao del Norte. Photograph from save Our Schools Network

Reports reaching Manila indicated that more than a hundred persons on their way to attend the anniversary of a tribal school network are stranded in Talaingod town, Davao del Norte after they were reportedly barred from proceeding by members of the Alamara militia and members of the municipal tribal council of elders.

"There are 116 of us, including around 60 students" from schools in Davao del Norte, Davao Oriental and Compostela Valley run by the Salugpungan Ta Ta'nu Igkanugon Learning Center, said Rius Valle, spokesman of the Save Our Schools Network from a church in Talaingod, where they said they have sought "temporary sanctuary" while waiting to meet with Mayor Basilio Libayao to resolve the problem.

The Salugpungan schools are among tribal learning centers that the military and counter-insurgency militias openly accused of advocating support for communist rebels, and have even occupied from time to time, invariably triggering the evacuation of indigenous lumad communities.

Some 700 Manobo from Talaingod have been sheltering for months at the Haran Mission House of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines in Davao City after their communities and schools were occupied by the military and militia elements.

This followed attempts, which even involved the Department of Education in Davao del Norte, to shut down the tribal schools. 

In Surigao del Sur province, the accusations against the tribal schools and the communities they serve were associated with the September 1 murders of Emerito Samarca, executive director of the award-winning Alternative Learning Center for Agricultural and Livelihood Development or ALCADEV, and Manobo leaders Dionel Campos and Datu Bello Sinzo in Han-ayan, Lianga town by the Magahat militia.

According to residents who fled after the killings, Army soldiers had occupied the community before the militia arrived, and they merely watched from their nearby bivouac while Campos and Sinzo were executed in front of hundreds of witnesses, including children.

The Lianga killings triggered the mass evacuation of more than 3,000 lumad who are now staying at the sports center in Tandag City, capital of Surigao del Sur.

Although the military in the past has acknowledged organizing militias, including tribal groups, as "force multipliers" against communist rebels, following the outrage that followed the Lianga killings, they now deny having anything to do with the paramilitary groups.

However, during a recent inquiry into the recent spate of atrocities against the lumad conduced by the Commission on Human Rights in Davao City, Talaingod Mayor Libayao was quoted as telling a hearing that the Alamara no longer exists and that its members have been assimilated into the Civilian Armed Forces Geographical Unit, an officially sanctioned paramilitary group that is under the control and supervision of the Armed Forces.

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/118130/alamara-militia-in-talaingod-blocks-lumads-from-salugpungan-rites