Mindanao is becoming terrorism hub for the region
Published on: Sunday, June 11, 2017
THE war on terrorism in the Philippines began with the Marawi City attack initiated by the Maute group last May 23.The ongoing war which already killed more than 100 civilians, dozens of government soldiers and scores of Maute loyalists also destroyed properties worth billions of pesos and displaced thousands of families, both Christians and Muslims.The Marawi war forced President Rodrigo Duterte to immediately declare martial law in the entire island of Mindanao and suspended the writ of habias corpus.
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With the declaration of martial law in Mindanao, curfew was also imposed and military checkpoints were established everywhere not excluding Zamboanga peninsula, the provinces of Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi.The majority of the Mindanaoans welcomed the initiative of Duterte as vested upon him the power to declare martial law under the Philippine Constitution, however, critics of the President especially those in Luzon and Visaya islands outrightly opposed the military take over. But who is the Maute group and what are they fighting for?The history of the Maute group is a tale of religious madness and hate.This terror group first emerged in Butig town in Lanao del Sur more than two years ago, just as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in the Middle East started to hit the news.
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Founded by siblings Omar and Abdulla Maute, the group was originally named Dawlah Islamiya, but eventually became more known as the Maute terror group, now feared for its impunity.Omar and Abdullah are descendants of a big Maranaw warrior clan in Butig, a hinterland town in the first district of Lanao del Sur. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) has a government-recognised enclave in Butig, the Camp Busrah Siomorong.
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It was also somewhere in the same municipality where the founder of MILF, the late Imam Salamat Hashim, was laid to rest after he died of a cardiovascular disease in 2003.Omar and Abdullah were former contract workers in the Middle East, who both studied Islamic theology in between works in secular schools in Syria and in the United Arab Emirates.They are both espousing hatred to non-Muslims and are known for their propensity in enforcing a Taliban-style justice system, which Maranaws find ruthless and absolutely primitive.Local officials and moderate clerics disagree with the kind of Islam being preached by the Maute group, premised on what is widely perceived as "distorted concept" of a puritanical Islamic community governed by a Sharia justice system and absolutely detached from non-Muslims. Moderate clerics argue there is not even a single verse in the Qur'an encouraging persecution of non-Muslims.Islam has very extensive teachings on universal love, fraternalism and tolerance based on the principle "la iqra fidin," meaning there is no compulsion in religion.Preachers opposed to the ways of the Maute group use as pitch in countering its radical views how their prophet, Mohammad, extended friendship to the Catholic, Jewish and pagan communities in the ancient Mediterranean communities that were to become the different countries now in the Middle East and North Africa.For many residents of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), which covers all 39 towns in Lanao del Sur and its capital, Marawi City, Maute terrorists are but fanatically misguided group of Islamic militants inspired by ISIS and with extremely dangerous tendencies.The group's initial adventurism in Butig, in what seemed a baptism of fire, ruined the town and dislocated thousands of residents, many of them still reluctant to return to their villages that were plundered in one attack after another from between 2015 until early this year.There are local officials in Maguindanao who have stories purporting that no fewer than 10 young recruits of the Maute brothers were trained in fabrication of improvised explosive devices by the slain Malaysian terrorist Marwan and his Maguindanaon cohort, Abdulbasit Usman, in Barangay Pidsandawan in Mamasapano town in late 2014.Marwan, whose real name is Zulkifli bin Hir, was killed by a team of the police elite Special Action Force in a dawn raid at Barangay Pidsandawan in Mamasapano, Maguindanao on January 25, 2015.Usman, an ethnic Maguindanaon, was shot dead about three months later by guerrillas of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in keeping with their ceasefire accord with the government, which enjoins both sides to mutually cooperate in neutralising criminal gangs and terrorists in potential flashpoint areas in Southern Mindanao.The Maute group became even more notoriously popular when its members beheaded in April 2016 captives Salvador Janobas and his younger brother, Jaymart, on mere suspicion they were spies of the military.The Visayan victims were lowly labourers in a mini sawmill owned by an illegal logger in Butig.They were kidnapped by Maute gunmen a month before they were executed, after their family failed to raise a P5 million ransom in exchange for their release.A video footage of their brutal execution was immediately circulated via Facebook timelines of local self-proclaimed Jihadists using aliases.Relatives said even before Omar and Abdullah organised the Dawlah Islamiya, they already have links with the founder of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) in Maguindanao, the late Ustadz Ameril Umbra Kato.Kato was also a radical cleric trained in a religious school in Saudi Arabia. He studied abroad as a government scholar during the time of President Ferdinand Marcos.Kato started as a commander in the MILF, but got booted in 2010 for insubordination and differences with members of their central committee.The Maute brothers even reportedly sent representatives to visit Kato in his hideout in a hinterland surrounded by Maguindanao's South Upi, Guindulungan and Datu Saudi towns after he suffered a hypertensive stroke that left half of his body paralysed and eventually caused his demise.The Maute group and the Abu Sayyaf fused ranks early this year, according to local officials in Lanao del Sur and sources in the Army's intelligence community.The BIFF, the Abu Sayyaf and the Maute group have a common denominator – that of using the black ISIS flag as their revolutionary banner.It was learned that the Maute group has links with the notorious Abu Sayyaf group and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BFF) and wishes to be affiliated with ISIS.It was in February 1, 2014 when the Philippine military confirmed that they discovered a black flag in a BIFF camp which is a sign that ISIS is trying to penetrate the country. Why did they revive this old fashion practice to change the prospective of the young current Muslims in the world?The perpetrators organised the narco-terrorist army that aims to bring about a state where men will no longer have the wills of their own.Illegal drugs were used for mass mind control and are always part of the regular law intensity warfare against free people in the free society.Abu Sayyaf is part of the group founded under the organised narco-terrorist armies. Their locations of violence are in southern Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, and Indonesia. And its first Abdulrajik Abubakar Janjalani, a Filipino Muslim who fought in the international Islamic brigade in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation.Janjalani was not a former Moro National Liberation (MNLF) member because the name Abu Sayyaf seems to be an abbreviation of the names of his first comrades in the organisation: A- abubakar, B- barisi, U-usman, S-sampanid, A-ali unos, A-abdurak, F-faizal or ABU SAAF. In Arabic, it means "Owner Of The Sword".The front activities of Abu Sayyaf are stealing money and guns, kidnapping-for-ransom, bombarding civilians, beheading hostages and raping women.The increase and extreme violence attacks was in response to the challenge posted by Abubakar Bagdadi to the Abu Sayyaf to kill Christians, terrorise cities, show mass fear and terror so they can be recognised as part of the extremist.They believe that the tiny core of activists could topple any government through means of terror alone.Many Muslims in Mindanao join the group because Janjalani led them to the thought that they are founded to defend their brothers abused by landlords.The Abu Sayyaf allegedly also want to defend the Muslim community against the military bonets and undisciplined politicians.But in reality they are patterned from Islamic terrorist group. They maintain the conflict between Muslim and Christians to prevail low irregular intensity warfare in the Philippines and other nations.According to the military authorities in the Philippines, the Maute clan presently has three groups of which the first is the religious group which is composed of the Mauto brothers Abdullah and Omar.The two brothers are, in fact, Philippine scholars who were sent to study in Middle East where they were radicalised.Their father Cayamoro Macaraya who was arrested recently in Davao City was a former high ranking officer of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and part of the religious organisation.The second group is reportedly involved in legal business operating in Mindanao while the third group is operating illegal drugs to help finance the operation of the organisation. The group has also successfully connected ties with some local politicians in Mindanao to achieve their desired terroristic objectives.The Maute group tried to establish the Islamic State in Malaysia but failed. The group attempted to do the same in Indonesia but to no avail.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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