ZAMBOANGA CITY, 14 September 2006 — Military and local officials yesterday denied reports that some 1,000 civilians have evacuated their homes in the southern island of Jolo, about 950 km south of Manila, where troops are battling Abu Sayyaf militants.
The Italian news agency Adnkronos International (AKI) said military offensive on the restive island displaced some 1,000 people. It quoted social workers and villagers left homeless by the fighting between troops and militants.
“This is one of our big concerns. The people seem to be increasing in number but we have yet to deliver them some meaningful assistance,” it quoted Abdulwatan Mohammad, head of the island’s social and development office. He said the evacuees have yet to receive any relief assistance from the state.
But Maj. Eugenio Batara, a regional army spokesman, said the military had no reports of evacuation in the island. “Those evacuating are members of the Abu Sayyaf and their supporters who are escaping military action in the mountains,” he told the Arab News.
Batara said security forces were battling the Abu Sayyaf since last month and had killed many of them in fierce clashes in Patikul town. But fighting were also reported in the hinterlands of Parang and Indanan towns. “We have no reports of civilian evacuation in Patikul or in any other towns because the fighting is concentrated only in the mountains, where the Abu Sayyaf is hiding,” he said.
Soldiers were after Abu Sayyaf chieftain Khadaffy Janjalani and two Jemaah Islamiya bombers — Dulmatin and Umar Patek — wanted by Jakarta for the deadly bombings in the Indonesian resort island that killed more than 200 people in 2002.
More than 100 militants and soldiers had been killed and wounded since the fighting began last month in Jolo after Filipino soldiers tracked down Dulmatin and Patek, who were reportedly being protected by the Abu Sayyaf, blamed for the spate of terrorism in the southern Philippines.
“The military should consider the civilians because they suffered most in this situation,” Edmund Gumbahali of the civil society group known as the Concerned Citizens of Sulu told AKI. “I don’t think they can get the Abu Sayyaf just by the use of guns.”
It also quoted several evacuees in Jolo island, but it was unclear whether they were staying in temporary shelters or with their relatives. “Our living depends on our small farm but it is dangerous for us to go back to Patikul,” said Welda Silban, 36, who left her home soon after the military operation began more than a month ago.
Aki said Silban was very worried about her husband who had decided to stay in Patikul at their farm despite the war. “We had no choice. If he came with us, we would all die of hunger,” she said.
Rahma Saptula, 41, from Indanan town, also said she had to leave her husband behind to take their three children to safety. It was not possible for all of us to go because our little farm and our livelihood are there,” she said.
Benjamin Loong, the island’s governor, said there were no evacuation, although, those who fled from previous fighting earlier this year refused to return home. “We have no reports of new evacuations,” he said.
Maj. Gen. Eugenio Cedo, chief of the armed forces’ Western Mindanao Command, said soldiers have recovered vital documents, including four computer diskettes containing scripts written in Basaha Indonesia, believed left behind by Dulmatin and Patek at a jungle camp in Patikul town early this month, bolstering government suspicions that Jemaah Islamiyah was supporting the Abu Sayyaf operation in the south.
“We have recovered many documents, including four computer diskettes, believed owned by the Jemaah Islamiyah bombers. In it were scripts and texts written in Bahasa Indonesia with high intelligence value,” Cedo said.
He said the diskettes would be handed over to the authorities in Manila for translation.
Cedo said the seized documents showed the extent of the Jemaah Islamiya influence on the Abu Sayyaf. “We also recovered JI training and terrorism manuals and manuscripts on how to make IEDs (improvised explosive device). This shows the connection of the JI to the Abu Sayyaf,” he said.
The military also recovered a purported letter of a councilman in Jolo dated July 17, 2006 and addressed to Umbra Jumdail, a senior Abu Sayyaf leader. The letter was written on a yellow paper in local dialect, but Cedo did not say what was on the letter.
The United States offered as much as $10 million reward for the capture of Dulmatin and another $1 million for Patek’s head. Washington also put up $5 million bounties for each of known Abu Sayyaf leaders, including Janjalani.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo also offered up to P100 million rewardses for the capture of senior Abu Sayyaf leaders -— dead or alive.
Cedo said the offensive against the Abu Sayyaf will continue even as Muslims prepare for the Ramadan, Islam’s holiest month. “There is no timeline in this operation against the terrorists. Sooner or later, the Abu Sayyaf and the JI will be neutralized,” he said.
A small group of US soldiers involved in training Filipino troops in anti-terror warfare were helping the local military in the hunt for Janjalani and Dulmatin and Patek.
Observers said, however, that winning the war on terror on Jolo, a traditional stronghold of the Abu Sayyaf, will not succeed unless local town officials actively help in the campaign.
Many officials and civilians fear of reprisals from the Abu Sayyaf if they help the military, although the promise of huge bounties offered by the United States and the Philippines had changed the minds of the few, some officials have told Arab News.
Some enterprising villagers, meanwhile, reportedly continue to take advantage of the fighting by pretending to be war refugees or mingle with the evacuees for them to avail of the government aid, mostly rice and medicines.
