Bangsamoro sees business, tourism boost with air link

SERENE | The serenity in a typical coastal community in Tawi-Tawi province, such as this one in Simunul town, is a major attraction for people looking for a break from their hectic urban living. (Photo by BONG SARMIENTO / Inquirer Mindanao)

BONGAO, Tawi-Tawi, Philippines — Moro civil society leader Guiamel Alim, who is married to a Tausug, longed for the day that Cotabato City, the regional capital of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), will be easily accessible to the region’s island provinces, or at least to Sulu.

On June 9, Philippine Airlines (PAL) Flight PR-2487 finally made that possible. Carrying 174 passengers, including government officials and several journalists, the Airbus A320 aircraft took off from the Cotabato Airport in Datu Odin Sinsuat town, Maguindanao, at 7:53 a.m.

Before the plane could taxi, BARMM Interim Chief Minister Ahod “Al Haj Murad” Ebrahim addressed the passengers through the public address system, being mistaken as the pilot by those not familiar with his voice.

“This flight signals [the end] of the long-time challenge of connectivity of Tawi-Tawi with the (Bangsamoro) mainland and other parts of the country,” Ebrahim said. “I wish you a pleasant and a blessed flight,” he added.

By 8:51 a.m., the plane touched down at Sanga-Sanga Airport here, and welcomed with a water salute by locals optimistic of new economic and tourism opportunities that the biweekly flight (Monday and Thursday) will bring to this island-province, the southernmost part of the country.

TOUCHDOWN The Airbus A320 that services Philippine Airlines Flight PR-2487 lands in Sanga-Sanga Airport in Bongao, Tawi-Tawi, on June 9 with 174 passengers, signaling a milestone for connectivity in the Bangsamoro region. —BONG SARMIENTO

Circuitous route

Prior to the flight’s inaugural, travel to Tawi-Tawi from central Mindanao is circuitous, laborious and expensive. One had to endure the long drive to Zamboanga City where a direct flight could be taken to Bongao. Or, fly to Metro Manila then Zamboanga and on to Bongao. There is also the option of going via Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia then Sandakan or Lahad Datu and on to Tawi-Tawi by boat.

“It has long been our dream to have a flight from Cotabato to Tawi-Tawi,” Ebrahim said at the launching of the maiden flight that came three years after the creation of the BARMM.

The region’s component provinces in the Sulu archipelago (Basilan, Sulu, and Tawi-Tawi) and mainland Mindanao (the contiguous Lanao del Sur and Maguindanao) are connected only by the Moro Gulf, a maritime trading route during the olden days of the sultanates.

Under the Bangsomoro Organic Law, the BARMM’s charter, the region’s sense of territorial contiguity is through the Bangsamoro waters which lie mostly on the Moro Gulf.

The new air route bridges that physical distance, and “brings further the mainland and island provinces of the BARMM much closer to each other,” said Mindanao Development Authority Chair Maria Belen Acosta.

Arlene Sevilla, a professor at Tawi-Tawi Regional Agricultural College and a civil society leader, said the flight offers comfort and lesser cost.

PR-2487 leaves Cotabato at 7:30 a.m. for a 70-minute flight to Bongao. Return flight PR 2488 leaves Bongao at 9:40 a.m.

Sevilla, who travels to Cotabato City at least twice a month, said that without the new flights, it would be from 12 to 32 hours of travel, depending on whether one takes a plane or boat from Bongao to Zamboanga City.

Acosta said the ease of travel brought by the air connectivity “will boost tourism and economic exchanges within and outside of BARMM,” the country’s second fastest growing region in 2021.

DIVERSE ATTRACTIONS Arab trader and preacher Sheikh Karimul Makhdum established the first mosque in the country after arriving on the island of Simunul in Tawi-Tawi from Johor in 1380. The original wooden pillars of the first mosque are preserved inside this new structure. 
—PHOTO BY KARLOS MANLUPIG

Cultural experience

Sevilla said tourists from mainland Mindanao will surely be drawn to Tawi-Tawi’s unique attractions and the cultural experience travel to the province offers.

Bangsamoro parliament member Amir Mawallil looks forward to a new wave of tourist influx into the province which can help deepen the cultural connection of the people with the rest of Mindanao and the country.

The people of Tawi-Tawi, he said, are known for their skills in crafts such as mat weaving or the centuries-old tradition of boat-building.

“So many beautiful places to explore from forest, caves, to white sandy beaches, and rich colors and cultures, bustling markets,” Mawallil said.

Among the province’s most popular sites is Sitangkai, which is known as the “Venice of the Philippines” for the use of boats as principal means of transportation around town.

In Bongao, there is the Boloboc Cave, declared a heritage site by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts as fossils like those found in Palawan’s historic Tabon Cave were also found there. In Bud Bongao, Tawi-Tawi’s highest mountain, one can see macaques and the oldest molave tree in the country, and four tombs believed to be of the oldest traditional leaders of Bongao.

In Simunul, one could explore the first mosque to be built in the country by Sheikh Makhdum, the island resort of Sangay Siapuh, dubbed the “Maldives of the South,” and an underwater cave.

In almost every town, there are beach resorts that boast of clear, pristine waters.

The gastronomic treat is superb. Among the culinary delights are sea mantis, tiger lobsters and the occasional reef fish mameng (Napoleon wrasse) which are either steamed, fried, buttered or baked. There are also the tihi-tihi (sea urchins) and the host of seashells which can be eaten with the famous sambal, the local chili sauce. The food tour may be capped with the famous tyulah itum, beef cooked in coconut milk with turmeric, roasted coco meat, and chilies.

A beach resort in Sangay Siapuh (below), also in Simunul, which has crystal clear waters, is another prime destination in the province.—PHOTO JOHNNY LEE

Business, tourism, security

BARMM Interior Minister Naguib Sinarimbo said the air route would make the movement of goods and services between Cotabato City and Tawi-Tawi faster and will make the province “the major frontier of the region to the BIMP-EAGA (Brunei-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East Asian Growth Area).”

“The target is to extend the route to Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, to trigger more business and tourism in the area,” he added.

Brig. Gen. Romeo Racadio, commander of Joint Task Force Tawi-Tawi, assured the public that the province “remains generally peaceful” and is hopeful it will remain that way given the cooperation among local leaders, the community, and the private sector.

Reyani Romano, PAL sales and marketing head in Mindanao, said the company had been planning the service for several years but the COVID-19 pandemic stalled its rollout. But the company pursued it upon the request of the BARMM government, she added.

Rabbi Vincent Ang of PAL Express said the country’s flag carrier is proud to be part of this momentous event in the history of the Bangsamoro region.

“This is a testament of what the people of this region are capable of. This is not a flight that was made possible by Philippine Airlines. The people of this region made this flight possible. The leaders of this region made this flight possible,” Ang stressed.

Transportation and Communication Minister Dickson Hermoso, who led efforts to convince PAL to service the route, hopes that the frequency of flights will increase in the future as demand picks up.

“Hopefully this flight is the start of connectivity which is being longed for by our people,” Hermoso said.

—REPORTS FROM BONG S. SARMIENTO, CARMELITO Q. FRANCISCO, EDWIN O. FERNANDEZ AND JULIE S. ALIPALA

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