Awing Apuga (center) answers questions from the media during the Talaingod Municipal Peace and Order Council meeting in November 2018.
TALAINGOD, Davao del Norte (PIA) - How he wishes for unity and for peace. He is now 25 years of age and Awing Apuga wants to see his fellow members of Ata-Manobo tribe come back, till their ancestral lands and take care of their families.
“Kami mga lumad ang gusto namo makab-ot ang kahusay ug kalinaw para sa among lugar." (We, the indigenous people, want peace and order in our land.)
Apuga strongly expressed such desire during the Municipal Peace and Order Council (MPOC) Meeting at Talaingod Sangguniang Bayan Session Hall last month at the height of calls of Ata Manobo elders to close the Salugpungan Igtatanu Igkanugon Learning Centers known in Ata-Manobo sitios as “salugpungan”.
Claiming to previously serving as a salugpungan teacher, Awing is the son of Datu Guibang Apuga, a former Ata-Manobo New People’s Army (NPA) commander for 30 years.
Awing noted that Ata-Manabo communities especially in areas where salugpungan schools are located were breaking up as family heads have gone elsewhere joining protest rallies allegedly organized by teachers of salugpungan schools.
“Wala na sila nakatanum ug ensakto para sa ilang mga anak. Naa na sila nagapondo sa mga syudad. Ang problema namo diha ma’am kung sila manguli, asa pa kaha sila makapangita pagkaon nila para sa pamilya?" (They’re no longer tilling their lands for their children; they’re staying in cities. Our problem is that when they go home, where would they find food for their families?) he said.
In a separate statement during the Municipal Peace and Order Council (MPOC) meeting, Datu Guibang Apuga decried the salugpungan schools for allegedly causing the disintegration of Ata-Manobos as some of them go elsewhere joining anti-government activities.
“Ang ubang mga babaye ginagamit sa rally, ang ubang lalaki, gigamit sa pwersa kabilang grupo (Women were used to join rallies; men were used in forces of another group,” he said referring to the NPA.
He was speaking in Ata-Manobo dialect translated by Dexter May-as, who was recognized by the MPOC as an interpreter. “Gusto nga mapa undang ang eskwelahan para maundang ang kasamok aron dili matibulaag ang katawhan ug miembro sa among tribo. (We want this school to stop, to end the chaos so our people won’t get dispersed),” he said.
His appeal was the content of a letter he sent to the municipal government of Talaingod that was taken up during the MPOC meeting on November 16. Along with other tribal leaders of the Ata-Manobo Council of Elders, his call echoed far and wide, and reached the provincial government of Davao del Norte during the arrest on November 28 of former Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo and ACT Teachers Rep. France Castro.
The pair were arrested along with 16 other "activists" on November 28 for alleged kidnapping and trafficking of minors in Talaingod, Davao del Norte. Ocampo and Castro, however, denied the charges.
Ocampo, Castro and the 16 other respondents were released on December 1 after posting bail.
In a statement released on December 3, Davao del Norte Governor Anthony G. del Rosario said the arrest “exposed the wiles of the leftist organizations in using the IPs to push their own agenda.”
Del Rosario supported the calls of the Ata-Manobo, saying “the authorities and tribal leaders have since decried how the salugpungan schools are used in the anti-government propaganda of the leftist organizations and training ground for their armed struggle.”
In the same statement, Del Rosario enumerated some programs that the provincial government has put in place in Talaingod and the plans it has drawn to deliver the needed services of the Ata-Manobos. “We cannot allow few cunning individuals to mar our development momentum in the Lumad municipality."
"I invite the leftist organizations to stop exploiting our poor lumads and start working closely with the government in genuinely advancing the rights, protection, welfare and development of our IP people,” he said.
https://pia.gov.ph/news/articles/1015915
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