MONKAYO, Compostela Valley, Philippines—Leaders of four Compostela Valley tribes have started discussions to settle a dispute over a 950-hectare mining site that has been blamed for the deaths of at least three tribal leaders in as many years.
The four tribes—Mansaka, Mandaya, Mangguangan and Dibabawon—all claim the land as part of their ancestral domain.
The dispute is said to be behind attacks on leaders of the tribes, three of whom have already been killed since 2008.
Early in 2008, Datu Carlito Buntas of the Dibabawon tribe and his son were wounded in an ambush on their way to a tribal meeting in Monkayo town proper. Later that year, Datu Florelio Andresan, a Mandaya chieftain, was killed by motorcycle-riding assassins, also in Monkayo.
Last year, Datu Carlito Chavez, another Dibabawon chieftain, was shot dead by unidentified men while he was taking a snack in a bakery in Monkayo.
Last April, Bai Florita Caya, another tribal leader, was shot dead by a lone gunman as she tended her store in Poblacion, Monkayo.
The police, in subsequent investigation reports, pointed to the dispute as the root of the killings.
<STRONG>“Third parties’’</STRONG>
But Datu Bawan Lanes, executive director of the Mindanao Indigenous Peoples Conference for Peace and Development, a confederation of Mindanao tribal chiefs, said they believed that the attacks were carried out by “third parties.”
”They do not want us to be united,” Lanes said, citing the entry of large-scale mining companies in the province.
“No one in the tribes was happy (over the killings). Those people were our kalumuns (brothers),” a said a Mandaya datu, who asked not to be identified by name for fear of reprisals.
That’s why in late April, Lanes said representatives of the four tribes started a peace settlement for the rights to the tribal mining area.
He said tribal chieftains performed a “limpas,” a ritual of forging peace to resolve years of distrust and animosity.
”The limpas, conducted at a school gymnasium in Monkayo last April 20 was initiated by the tribes themselves as a show of reconciliation and unity,” Lanes said.
Lanes said the four tribes had proven they could work together when as a group, they entered into an agreement with the Philippine Mining Development Corp. , the state-owned company tasked to develop the 8,100-hectare Mt. Diwalwal Mineral Reservation Area in 2009.
The agreement stipulated that members of the tribes would mine the area. He said a similar agreement could work in the Monkayo area.
<STRONG>Polarization of tribes</STRONG>
Roque Agton, chair of the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, said the polarization of the tribes started when each of the leaders brought in their own partner-investors.
Datu Lito Onlos of the Mangguangan tribe said they hope rifts among tribal leaders and their constituents would be mended.
He noted that during the limpas, a sacrificial pig was buried.
“The pig was buried and not eaten as a symbol of burying whatever enmities and other negative thoughts the tribes used to have against each other,” he said.
Datu Rosalino Banad of the Mandaya tribe said the limpas was a sacred way of making peace among the tribes and should not be violated.
“The ritual holds effect for generations. It is also done once and could not be repeated. If limpas is violated, it means a pangayao (holy war) is imminent,” Onlos said.