Villagers arrive by boats to flee the current standoff between Government troopers and Muslim rebels at the southern port city of Zamboanga Wednesday, Sept. 11, 2013. AP PHOTO/BULLIT MARQUEZ
ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines—Aliya Abdulkarim put her 4-month-old daughter and all of her belongings in a boat and for almost three hours paddled away from Rio Hondo to escape fighting between government troops and Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) rebels on Monday.
When she arrived at the seawall along RT Lim Boulevard (better known as Cawa-Cawa), she discovered that her daughter was already dead.
Abdulkarim said she failed to feed and attend to her daughter.
“I was the only one who took all of our belongings and who paddled the boat. My daughter was ill and we had no money for the hospital,” she said.
Abdulkarim is just one of the hundreds of residents of Rio Hondo who took to the sea to avoid getting caught in the crossfire between the soldiers and the rebels.
Myrna Hamid, who also arrived at the seawall in a vinta, said the villagers were told to leave because government troops were coming for a house-to-house search for the rebels.
Blind sisters Dalma and Sitti Ainuddin, both in their 70s, also fled Rio Hondo with the help of a grandson who rowed their small vinta.
Grandstand full
Abdulkarim, Hamid and the Ainuddin sisters will remain at the seawall as Zamboanga City’s sports complex (better known here as grandstand) is already filled with evacuees.
There were also those who fled on foot, including Norma Hashim and her three children. They walked some 6 kilometers to the city from Rio Hondo.
On Wednesday, Mayor Maria Isabelle Climaco-Salazar reported that as of Tuesday night, 3,159 families, or 12,907 people, were sheltered at the sports complex and 13 other evacuation centers.
The figures did not include evacuees who arrived on Wednesday.
The evacuees were among those who fled their homes after MNLF fighters arrived in coastal villages here at dawn on Monday. They claimed they were here to march to Plaza Pershing where they would hold a rally to declare the independence of the “Bangsamoro Republik.”
The rebels belong to the MNLF faction led by Nur Misuari, who opposes peace talks between the government and the bigger Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and insists on the full implementation of the 1996 peace agreement.
Misuari’s followers have taken hostages and are using them as human shields to thwart an assault by government troops who have encircled them in Santa Catalina and Santa Barbara villages here.
More evacuees
More people arrived at the sports complex on Wednesday afternoon following skirmishes in the villages of Canelar and Camino Nuevo where two rebels were reported killed.
Jonalyn Mendoza and her two children said there was no space left for them inside the sports complex.
More than a hundred Badjao and Samal arrived at the seawall in small vintas.
Trucks arrived with more evacuees from the villages of Mampang, Canelar and San Roque.
Randy Bancayrin, San Roque village chief, said he lost a village guard, Jun Macrohon, when Air Force troops fired on them, mistaking them for rebels.
Macrohon’s son Ritchie was wounded and in a critical condition, Bancayrin said.
He added that soldiers shot at village guards without asking questions. He said the troops entered San Roque without coordinating with local authorities.
Tension gripped the villages of Rio Hondo, Mariki, Santa Barbara, Santa Catalina, San Roque, Mampang and Canelar where government troops and the rebels traded gunfire.
In Talon-Talon village, where six residents were taken as hostages by the rebels, life began to return to normal on Wednesday after the insurgents departed.
“So far, there are no more [MNLF rebels] on the highway. We got word from the military that they reunited with their colleagues—the group in Santa Catalina,” Talon-Talon village council member Teodyver Arquiza said.
Businesses take risks
In some parts of the city, small shops, bakeries, grocery stores, gasoline stations and flea markets opened at 6 a.m. on Wednesday. But they shut down even before 2 p.m. when government troops and rebels exchanged gunfire in the villages of Canelar and San Roque, and a fire broke out in Santa Barbara.
Pocholo Soliven, manager of Mindpro Citi Mall Supermarket and Bloomingdales Department Store, said the mall was back to “business as usual.”
Soliven, who is also president of the Zamboanga City Chamber of Commerce, said the mall was trying to operate normally but mindful of the public’s safety.
Edwin To, owner of the Budgetwise grocery store, just a mortar’s fire away from the areas of conflict, said he was “taking chances” by opening for business.
“More people are going to the [stores]. They just buy what they need for the family and there is no hoarding or price increase,” To said.
Skirmishes
But in Santa Catalina, the situation was more tense as government troops fought with rebels on Wednesday morning. A resident was wounded in the crossfire.
Belman Malandi, Santa Catalina village chief, said skirmishes between soldiers and rebels continued and few residents remained, mainly to secure their homes.
Two residents of Santa Catalina were slightly wounded by shrapnel from an M-79 fired by Marines. Soldiers of the 32nd Infantry Battalion treated the wounded civilians.