Yesterday forty six people were slaughtered in Maguindanao. The news is reporting it as a feud between two datu clans among the Moros. Blood feuds among politically important clans in the Philippines are not uncommon, and the rivalry of the two Mindanawan families involved (Mangudadatu and Ampatuan) is well known.
Further, Maguindanao is underdeveloped, there are unexploited resources in Maguindanao, and there are shifting appreciations of ancestral claims to status.
[Mangudadatu and Ampatuan are both powerful in Maguindanao and Sultan Kudarat, and both originate from Dumatu lineages in the Maguindanao area. The Dumatu class claim descent from a pre-Islamic noble (Tabunaway) who acknowledged the sovereignty of Sharif Kabungsuwan in the fifteen hundreds, being granted hereditary privileges and exemptions in return. The word 'dumatu' indicates one who is of chiefly (datu) rank without necessarily being a chief - chiefly by inherited status rather than by position or appointment. They are neither "datu" (rulers, chiefs) nor "tau ma'indatu" (the ruled, the subject populace). The Dumatus were politically important in the sultanate. No leader could become sultan without Dumatu backing. Maguindanao and Sultan Kudarat are both Muslim areas in Mindanao, most of which has been Christianised by land theft and ethnocide throughout the American period and Philippine independence, shockingly so during the Marcos years.]
DEATH TOLL RISES TO 46 FOR PHILIPPINES KILLINGS
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8375588.stm
[And also: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8374507.stm]
The explanation of a political blood feud is too easy, and given the murderous involvement of Christians in Mindanao, not believable.
It is not that long ago that Ferdinand Marcos caused Muslims to fight each other, and the memory of the death-squads (ilaga) employed by Christian industrialists and entrepreneurs to eradicate whole villages in the hinterlands is still fresh - the empty eye sockets of dead Muslims still ooze blood in the memories of their kinfolk. And if the Marcos goons and Illustrado death-squads weren't enough to cast suspicion on impugned motives and glib explanations for mass death in Mindanao, the record of the Philippine Constabulary (Hukbo'ng Pamayapa nang Pilipinas) in the south speaks for itself. The PC depopulated where it could not conquer, raped and enslaved among brutalized Moros when convenient, and engaged in wholesale torture, brigandage, and corruption where-ever the Christian Philippinos wished Muslims disinherited or driven from the land. Marcos sent them to Mindanao to suppress a revolt which he had engineered, and multitudes of rapacious opportunists followed them into the south to expropriate land and exploit resources. The Philippine timber industry was built on the theft of Muslim property.
A large bunch of dead Muslim Philippinos is just too convenient.
Every Philippine president since the fifties has claimed violence in Mindanao as an excuse to pull a staggering bit of chicanery in Luzon.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo may be the ultimate beneficiary of these murders - she's capable, she's cunning, and she's well-connected. And certainly, manipulation, treachery, and political warfare are all hers by both nature and nurture, given that she is a member of the Philippine ruling elite.
Ms. Arroyo has a well-known personal connection to Mindanao, and is herself a member of a powerful dynasty - her father (Diosdado P. Macapagal) was president of the Philippines in the early sixties.
Even if she herself has clean hands, her cronies most certainly do not.
There have been numerous allegations of corruption, illegal detentions, torture, and political murder against her regime.
It will be interesting to see what develops.
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6 comments:
I have posted your blog here -
http://www.topix.net/world/philippines/2009/11/death-in-mindanao-the-rivalry-of-the-two-mindanawan-families-involved
Welcome to comment.
From BBC:
"Human Rights Watch has expressed concern the central government's close relationship with the Ampatuan clan would hinder an impartial investigation. "
Source:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8377875.stm
Further quote: "Analysts say the Ampatuans have effectively been in charge of the restive province of Maguindanao for decades.
Andal Ampatuan Senior has served in the Philippines Congress and won the governorship of Maguindanao unopposed for several terms.
His son, Andal Ampatuan Jr, was reportedly planning a similarly unopposed run to replace his father."
There will be no justice.
From the New York Times:
"The army announced that it would disband a 200-member militia controlled by the clan suspected in the Monday attack, the Ampatuan family. Later on Wednesday, Mrs. Arroyo’s political party, the Lakas Kampi CMD, announced that it had expelled the patriarch of the Ampatuan clan, Andal Ampatuan Sr., and two of his sons, Datu Unsay Mayor Andal Jr. and Zalday. "
Source:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/26/world/asia/26phils.html?ref=world
Further quote: "The killings appeared to be directly linked to an electoral challenge to the Ampatuans mounted by the Mangudadatu family, which is based in a neighboring province. But they were rooted in a long-established political system where the national government has supported and sometimes armed families to curb the influence of Muslim and Communist insurgents. "
There will be no justice.
For the goberment of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to so soon, so fast, declare that they know the guilt of Andal Ampatuan, signifies only that they wish to divest themselves of a pesky liability.
How could they know that he is connected, unless they already knew about it before?
Such quick accusation suggests predetermined guilt - in other words, constabulary involvement. The savagery of the attack seems calculated to inflame tension and prompt further bloodshed.
There will be no justice.
From CanadaCom:
"My wife's private parts were slashed four times, after which they fired a bullet into it," he added.
Source:
http://www.canada.com/news/Philippine+govt+expels+massacre+suspect+toll+hits/2263950/story.html
"They speared both of her eyes, shot both her breasts, cut off her feet, fired into her mouth. I could not begin to describe the manner by which they treated her."
There will be no justice.
To the author:
Just to rectify your inputs and probably your sources whether it was or were authored by credible historians presumably.
The Dumatu clan descended from Rajah Tabunaway, the legendary chieftain of Maguindanao. The progenitor of the Dumatu Class.The arrival of Shariff Kabunsuan and the conversion of the natives into Islam paved the way for the establishment of Maguindanao Sultanates.Partly because Tabunaway himself relinquished his soveriegnty to Shariff Kabunsuan.
The Dumatus were not previously identified in the history books of the Moro people in Maguindanao.
The Sultanate of Maguindanao is distinct from the Rajahnate of Buayan. The Ampatuans belong to the Rajah sa Buayan Kingdom. The Rajah sa Buayan Kingdom was Islamized earlier than the people of Tabunaway...but the propagation of Islam was not successful in the case of Kabungsuan.
My point is it is not safe to conclude that these warring clans originated from the dumatu class. But it is a fact that most members of the Dumatu class has some intermarriges with other cognatic decent group.
The other facts you stated about the Dumatu Class is correct.
I have the authority to rectify you or any other imminent author that would try to elaborate the Dumatus.
I am an 8th generation grandson of Rajah Tabunaway. My grand father in my fathers side is the 6th generation grandson of Tabunaway, and my grandmother is the sister of Datu Usi the Datu sa Kaludan sa Maguindanao.
We kept our own tarsila that is distinct and separate from the written tarsilas of the Maguindanao Sultanate and Rajah sa Buayan.
Thank you for acknowledging the Dumatus in you article.
Abdulbasit Tabunaway Usi Uy
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