Muslims help bring blast victims to hospitals

COTABATO CITY—For Muslims in Midsayap town in North Cotabato province, the night before Christmas was no time to sleep.

As soon as they learned that the Catholic church in Midsayap was hit by a grenade attack as people were receiving Communion during Mass, they rushed to the scene to help.

At least 16 churchgoers were wounded in the explosion.

Mashod Ibrahim Salik, a development officer with the Spanish-funded Action Against Hunger-Philippines, deployed  community peace volunteers to help take the injured to clinics and hospitals.

For hours up to dawn on Christmas Day, the Muslim volunteers monitored the patients’ condition, ensuring enough blood supply for each of them.

Fortunately, most of the victims had only minor injuries, except for one whose toe might have to be amputated.

The attack, however, deepened the Moro people’s trauma from decades of conflict in the region.

“When will the [violent attacks on places of worship] ever stop?” asked peace worker Fatima Mending-Abas.

Her father, a regional irrigation official, was among the people killed in a bomb attack on a mosque years ago.

Abas said she did not want anyone to experience what she and her siblings went through as young orphans.

“It’s history repeating [itself],” said another Moro woman, who declined to be named. “It’s history of division all over again.”

“Somebody ought to write about the Mindanao bombings,” said Sharifa Pearlsia Ali-Dans of the Department of the Interior and Local Government. “The repeated style follows a pattern, including the kind of bomb used.”

Mayor Cynthia Guiani-Sayadi of Cotabato City condemned the attack on the church, saying incidents like this had no place in a civilized society.