Maguindanao leaders join Du30 party

BULUAN, Maguindanao -- Many incumbent
elected officials in this province joined President Duterte’s political party
in what was perceived to be a major change initially in the political landscape
for this part of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).An initial
batch of 31 mayors, nine vice mayors and nine provincial board members took
oath Saturday before Energy Undersecretary Benito Ranque, secretary general for
Mindanao of the Partido Demokratikong Pilipino–Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban), at
the BBGM hotel conference hall here.Maguindanao
Mayors’ League president Freddie Mangudadatu, who led the first batch of party
recruits, believed that majority of the province’s 36 mayors with their vice
mayors, 16 board members and over 350 municipal councilors, will follow suit to
make their province officially as a Duterte country.

Maguindanao,
which has more than 1.3 million registered voters – the largest in ARMM,
yielded a landslide vote for Duterte in the 2016 Presidential polls, despite
the fact that majority of the province’s sitting officials belonged to the
Liberal Party.The Duterte
presidential campaign in the ARMM was reportedly led by former Buluan Mayor
Ibrahim Mangudadatu, younger brother of Governor Esmael Mangudadatu locally
known as personal friend of the current chief executive.Gov.
Mangudadatu witnessed the oath-taking ceremony on Saturday. He did not take
oath because the PDP-Laban national hierarchy would swear him in a grand
ceremony soon, according to Ex-Mayor Mangudadatu, who is due for appointment as
party regional chairman for ARMM.

Duterte’s
landslide victory in Maguindanao broke the long-standing political history of
the province in yielding most votes to national candidates of reigning
political parties since the Martial Law era.

Local
political pundits said that majority Liberal Party-affiliated leaders in
Maguindanao and all other components of ARMM preferred Duterte’s being a
Mindanaon over political party loyalty.

In this
province, the reigning Mangudadatu political family had admitted shifting
support to Duterte in the 2016 polls because of his unheralded lending of a
helicopter, which enabled the Mangudadatus to promptly locate the site of the
infamous massacre of 58 people in Ampatuan, Maguindanao on Nov. 23, 2009.

At least 32 of
the massacre victims were media workers, while other of fatalities were members
of the Mangudadatu clan that was supposed to filed the gubernatorial candidacy
of then Buluan Vice Mayor Mangudadatu when way laid by more than 100 armed men
along the highway of Ampatuan town.