DATU PAGLAS, Maguindanao del Sur (MindaNews / 28 June) – “Does it look like an encounter happened here?” the mayor of this town asked as he joined members of a civilian-led […]
DATU PAGLAS, Maguindanao del Sur – “Does it look like an encounter happened here?” the mayor of this town asked as he joined members of a civilian-led fact-finding mission Tuesday morning in inspecting the mosque and the houses in the compound where seven persons were killed in the early hours of June 18 for allegedly firing at government operatives who came to serve a search warrant at around 2 a.m.
Datu Paglas Mayor Abubakar Paglas addresses a fact-finding team in the municipal hall on 27 June 2023. MindaNews photo by MANMAN DEJETO Armed with search warrants issued by Judge Angelito Rasalan on June 16, the operatives on June 18 arrived at the compound where brothers Nasser Yussef Husain alias Tutin Usop and Norjihad Madidis Husain alias Datdat Usop, lived, in search of firearms. Mayor Paglas lamented that the operatives did not coordinate with the local government unit, not even with barangay captain Nasrudin Nawal, who told the fact-finding mission that he learned about the operation only when he was awakened by gunshots.
Captain Nurjhasier Sali, acting police chief of Datu Paglas town in Maguindanao del Sur, assumed the post on June 16. At 2:28 a.m. on June 18, Sali received a call from a captain in the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group that they need assistance as there was resistance from the persons whose houses they were supposed to search. MindaNews photo by MANMAN DEJETO
It said the “horrific incident” happened in an MILF community “where the victims already filed their application for amnesty” as part of the implementation of the peace agreement between government and the MILF signed on March 27, 2014 and the Bangsamoro Organic Law of 2018 which paved the way for the creation of the BARMM.
It said what happened in Datu Paglas on June 18 is “only the latest of a string of law enforcement operations” in the BARMM “where loss of lives and injustice could have been prevented, had the concerned law enforcement agencies observed the Operational Guidelines for the Ad Hoc Joint Action Group ,” a peace process mechanism that both parties set up two decades ago.
Mayor Paglas said the two long firearms were supposed to be presented by the Husains during the decommissioning of MILF combatants. According to the report of Sali, who arrived at the compound shortly after 3 a.m., the search was “conducted in an orderly manner in the presence of” Madidis barangay chair Nawal and Kagawad Tatuan Nawal of Barangay Damawato.
Mayor Paglas, who was a few steps away from where Nawal stood, told the FFM that barangay captains are forced to sign documents due to fear. Bantay Ceasefire volunteer Mary Ann Arnado , a Member of Parliament in the Bangsamoro region, speaks with Datu Paglas Mayor Abubakar Paglas during a visit to the house of one of the seven victims killed during a law enforcement operation on June 18. The mayor accompanied members of the fact-finding mission to the Husain compound in Barangay Madidis on 27 June 2023. MindaNews photo by Carolyn O.
He said there is no MILF camp in Datu Paglas but “every barangay, may MILF” who are productive members of the town. The key witnesses to what happened inside the compound – the families of the slain victims – were interviewed Tuesday afternoon by another FFM team in the MILF camp in Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao del Sur.
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