SHOW PROOF. Parents belonging to the Ata Manobo tribe in Talaingod, Davao del Norte belie the claim of the University of San Carlos (USC)-Talamban Campus that they consented to their children's travel to Cebu, during a press briefing in Cebu City on Monday (Feb. 15, 2021). National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP) Caraga Regional Director Lawyer Marlon Bosantog, said Fr. Rogelio Bag-ao of USC lied when he claimed they let the children talk to their parents through video calls. (PNA photo by John Rey Saavedra)
CEBU CITY – An official of the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP) on Tuesday challenged a priest at the University of San Carlos (USC)-Talamban Campus here to show proof that they let the IP children in their custody talk to their parents from the mountain town of Talaingod, Davao del Norte through video calls.
Lawyer Marlon Bosantog, NCIP Caraga Regional Director, said Fr. Rogelio Bag-ao, superior of the Society of Divine Word Missionaries in the Philippine southern province, has lied in his statement released to Cebu media on Monday claiming he had constant communication with the IP children’s parents through social media.
Bosantog said Bag-ao should show a Zoom record or any recording that would show the conversations between the parents, who belong to the Ata Manobo tribe in Talaingod, and their children while in the retreat house for the “Lumad Bakwit School”.
“Wala namang signal sa bundok (There is no signal in the mountain). At this point, alam natin sinong nagsisinungaling (we know now who is lying). They are just trying to avoid responsibility,” he said in a virtual presser.
Bag-ao, in his statement, reacted to allegations that the rescued IP children were at the Bakwit school without consent, saying “the children have video calls with their parents and he himself follows up with the students to ask if they miss their parents”.
On Monday, social workers rescued 19 IP children from Talaingod, Davao del Norte and Sultan Kudarat reported having been illegally held at a USC retreat house of the USC since March last year.
Bag-ao is the manager of the retreat house where the IP children were rescued, and seven Salugpungan teachers were arrested.
Bosantog said appropriate cases, including but not limited to kidnapping, serious illegal detention, and child abuse will be filed against the seven teachers
“If the kids were taught how to carry firearms for warfare, that’s a violation of international humanitarian law on conscription of children as child warriors,” he said.
The government, he said, will look into the “complicity of the university” and possible violations to the rights of the IP children that are penalized under the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA).
Lorua Sambeyang, one of the six parents who came to Cebu through the help of the Municipal Social Welfare Office of Talaingod, told the media that many of them do not have mobile phones and do not even know how to operate gadgets.
Undersecretary Lorraine Badoy, spokesperson of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), defended the actions of the social workers and law enforcers in rescuing the IP children from the USC retreat house.
“It’s very clear that there are parents who are looking for their children and somebody died looking for their children who are in Cebu. In the first place, these children are here without the consent or any authorization from them,” Badoy said. “The rescue was really in place, that was really called for.”
The Ata Manobo parents said they were made to sign a paper when their children were taken from them but they did not even understand its content.
Sambeyang added that no one from the police nor any government agency forced them to go to Cebu.
She said she and her companions from the tribe are afraid of boat rides, but they mustered courage in the hope of reuniting with their children who were taken away from them three years ago.
In its Monday’s statement, the USC said Save Our Schools (SOS) Network, a non-governmental organization, assisted in the formation of Lumad Bakwit School in the university in order to help IP communities in Mindanao continue their studies amid the threat of aerial bombings and shutdown of community-built schools in their area.
“The Lumad Bakwit School, which was launched in UP Cebu in October 2019, is an effort from the Lumad community to continue their education despite the militarization of their communities, which has worsened over the decades,” said Regletto Imbong, convener of the SOS Network Cebu.
He said the Bakwit School conducted activities in different schools in Cebu such as Southwestern University PHINMA and St. Scholastica’s Academy in Tabunok, Talisay City.
In October 2019, the Department of Education in Region 11 ordered the closure of 55 Salugpungan schools due to several violations, including the relocation of students away from their homes without their parents' consent.
DepEd 11 also found out that the teachers of Salugpungan schools do not have the professional license to teach.
The schools operated within the ancestral domain of tribal communities without obtaining the mandatory Free and Prior Informed Consent (FPIC) and certification from the NCIP. (PNA)
