Daughter of slain Army carpenter to proceed with graduation along with foster dad

SULTAN KUDARAT ---- A Visayan Army officer will act as foster parent on the graduation rite Friday of a Muslim pupil whose father, a military carpenter, was killed by bandits Tuesday.Lt. Col. Harold Cabunoc, commanding officer of the 33rdInfantry Battalion, will escort the 13 year-old elementary pupil Hafra Macadatar to their graduation ceremony at the Palumbe Elementary School in Lambayong town in Sultan Kudarat.Her father, Tamano Macadatar, a corporal in the Army’s 524thEngineer Construction Battalion, was killed by a member of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters in Barangay Tukanalipao in Mamasapano, Maguindanao where he and companions were constructing a peace and learning facility for barrio folk.Cabunoc will be accompanied to the graduation program by Lt. Col. Maynard Camarao, the battalion commander of Macadatar. It’s an honor to stand as father of Hafra on the occasion his father, the late Tammy Macadatar, had supposedly prepared for and had wished to attend, Cabunoc said on Thursday.The child’s mother, Jean, an Ilocana, is employed in Kuwait and could not attend the event.Macadatar, a skilled construction worker, was a member of the Moro National Liberation Front who was integrated into the Army as part of the MNLF’s peace deal with the government.His unit was tapped by a non-government organization to help put up a peace center in Barangay Tukanalipao.He was killed in the project site by a BIFF bandit using a .30 caliber M1 Garand rifle.The suspect and his eight cohorts, also armed with assault rifles, managed to escape before responding policemen could reach the scene.More than 7,000 MNLF guerillas were absorbed by the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National Police after the group forged a final peace pact with Malacañang on September 2, 1996.The gruesome murder of the unarmed Macadatar enraged barangay leaders and local officials in Mamasapano.His superiors had earlier provided his immediate kin with cash assistance and facilitated his burial immediately after he was killed in keeping with Islamic tradition of burying the dead within 24 hours from the time of death.Cabunoc said Macadatar’s children are entitled to an AFP scholarship program for military dependents killed in line of duty.