JOLO, Sulu, 27 April 2003 - About 3,000 people including officials staged a pro-US rally in this southern stronghold of Abu Sayyaf bandits yesterday ahead of anti-terror operations with American troops taking part.
The rally, featuring nearly all the top local officials of the Sulu island group, voiced support for "Balikatan", the planned presence of US troops in Jolo this year to help local troops fight rebels notorious for kidnapping and beheading their victims.
Kadil Estino, mayor of Panglima Estino town, said in a speech that the people of Jolo favor development, not violence.
He criticized some opponents of the planned US presence. "These educated people are supposed to guide the ignorant and yet they are the ones encouraging suicide attacks against the Americans," he said.
He rejected charges that officials of the mainly Muslim island group of about half a million people had taken money from the Philippine and US governments to back the operations, scheduled for later this year.
Participants gathered outside the heavily guarded municipal hall in provincial capital, Jolo, and carried placards that read: "United for Balikatan."
Provincial and municipal officials led by Luuk town mayor Abdurahman Arbison and his son, Rep. Munir Arbison organized the rally.
Sulu provincial governor Yusop Jikiri said the turnout, considered impressive by many because of perceptions that the Sulu Tausugs were against the war games, made them more confident that residents of the island-province have thrown their full support behind Balikatan 03-1.
"If we keep on doing this effort, we can generate more than 70 percent support from the people," said Jikiri after the rally, dubbed "Enlightenment on Balikatan 03-1."
Jikiri later admitted that the rally was aimed at helping President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo counter the criticism against the war exercises and the presence of US troops.
Of the province's 18 town mayors, only Jolo Mayor Suhod Tan did not attend, although he sent a representative.
Tan had earlier said the Tausugs did not need the Americans. He had said that what the people of Sulu need more are projects to alleviate poverty and not more war.
But Jikiri said that even if Tan was not present, the mayor had "expressed his full support for this endeavor."
In a speech read for him by Jolo Councilor Edsir Tan, Mayor Tan urged the Tausugs to "look closely at the advantages and disadvantages of the Balikatan and let us not allow such military exercise to become a divisive factor in our unity."
In Marawi in mainland Mindanao, women took to the streets on Thursday to seek peace amid the continuing clashes between government troops and separatist fighters.
The women gathered at the People's Park in Barangay Sabir to attend the 1st Bangsamoro Women Assembly.
The secretariat recorded about 20,000 participants, including the Iranun, Yakan, Samal, Maranao, Maguindanao, Ips and Tausug women from as far as Tawi-Tawi.
"We strongly and always believed that these wars and conflicts whether global or domestic could be solved in peaceful dialogues through a United Nations-supervised referendum in Bangsamoro areas for us to be given the opportunity to determine our political status whether to remain part of the Philippines or to be independent," Ustaza Saguira Pendaliday, chair of the assembly, said.
Prof. Abhoud Syed Lingga, chair of the Bangsamoro People's Consultative Assembly, described the event as a historic gathering of women.
"I could not remember any women gathering as huge as this crowd where the Moro women took care of everything from the security to billeting..." Lingga said.
Maulana Alonto, vice chair of the Bangsamoro Development Agency, said the gathering showed the Moro women's political maturity as they were now very willing to express themselves for the good of the Bangsamoro homeland. (Inputs from agencies)
