Edgy Maranaos of Marawi

“Differing interpretations caused near panic to already desolate residents whose patience has run thin for the promised reconstruction of the city.

Post-traumatic syndrome from the Marawi siege is showing its signs on the Maranao residents. The tragedy has left a deep wound on their psyche which will take a lifetime to heal. They struggle to move on from the horrors of the war. They are not only suffering from acute depression, but have become edgy and weirdly panicky for the slightest optical aberration or oddity.

A fortnight ago, social media went abuzz among Maranao Internet enthusiasts over a construction of perimeter walls in some areas of Ground Zero. Their Facebook and Messenger platforms went into overdrive with paranoid concern about these walls, which they found odd. Activist Concon Domado posted pictures of the walls, which triggered a flurry of comments and reactions.

The issue stirred a hornet’s nest. A look-see at the pictures will really convince one that it is meant to segregate and divide portions of lands. Some claimed the wall segregated the areas for the construction of a military camp, earlier proposed by government but opposed by residents. The radical rabble-rousers offered an incendiary theory that the government is walling the city preliminary to government reclaiming ownership over the lands being a military reservation which were not declared by the President as free for public ownership, effectively taking away the lands from their pre-siege owners.

Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Member of Parliament Paisalin Tago chimed in, volunteering to bring the matter to the attention of the Parliament, which will determine if the controversy merits an investigation. And Councilor Pepe Basman promised to discuss the issue at the Sangguniang Panglungsod.

The differing interpretations caused near panic to already desolate residents whose patience has run thin for the promised reconstruction of the city. As we have warned before, this situation is fertile ground for the recruitment by violent extremists of false Islam.

Lawyer Mino Macalandap, president of the local Integrated Bar, fortunately dowsed cold water to the confusion and developing outrage of the residents. He volunteered the information he got from the military that these are blast walls, which are barriers to protect the immediate environs from the destructive effect of the unexploded ordnance now being detonated by the military.

Revenue District Officer Malic Umpar supported the position of Macalandap which helped stem the tension. Dr. Ali Dalidig, chief of the City Health Office, compared it initially, tongue-in-cheek, to the Berlin Wall, but explained later by citing the definition of a blast wall by Wikipedia.

I asked the city mayor who corroborated the explanation that these walls are a protective device.

It was a false alarm after all. It is not what was first thought of by the Maranaos. Far from it. They are protection from the shake, rattle, tremors and repercussions of the detonations.

This brings us to the problem of the Task Force Bangon Marawi (TFBM) — insufficient messaging. While they have waged an information drive through meetings and consultations about the reconstruction work — only the clearing took off to a slow pace — it is not effectively pervasive. We have suggested several outlets for their messaging, like city and barangay officials who could reecho to their constituency even tidbits of information fed to them by the TFBM. There is a need for this strategy in the light of the paucity of information outfits in the city. We have no access to mainstream print media and our Internet signal is weak, often off and on.

Civic leader and Moro activist “Palapa Swinger” raised his eyebrows over the integrity of the reconstruction process. He finds it strange that there is no crane with wrecking balls in the area. He suggested that the MSU Chat Group assumes social responsibility by organizing itself as monitors and “watch dog against any irregularities and practices of graft and corruption” in the reconstruction of the city.

But the immediate unexpected reactions of the residents are a positive development. It sends a signal to the TFBM that its work is closely watched.

The residents’ antennae are now active, super sensitive to what is happening around them. This is a far cry from their apathetic and devil-may-care attitude when they saw black-clad armed men roving the city streets at noontime on 23 May 2017, oblivious that it was the start of the bloody five-month siege by the Islamic State-Maute-Abu Sayyaf jihadists. They have learned their lessons.