Marawi bakwit questions Martial Law, warfare being used on few remaining ‘enemy’

There is something we need to tell Pres. Duterte. In truth, our question now was: why was Martial Law extended?

Marawi bakwit
The following is a translated transcript of the short message of Saide Abato, a Marawi bakwit in Iligan who spoke at Tindeg Ranao assembly in MSU Iligan on July 27, 2017. More than 400,000 residents fled Marawi from May 23 to 26 in fear of aerial strikes and stray bullets. They counted on their past experiences of seeing the end of such conflict in just a week or less. They saw that the government deployed a superior number of troops and arms against just a hundred or two ‘enemies,’ at most. Now the Marawi bakwits want to go back home. (Photo by Kayako Teshigawara / Bulatlat)

For two months we saw our houses being bombed. So how is it now? Our people from Marawi know what happened in two months . . . now with the extension of five more months . . . with Martial Law extended… What will be left of our houses?

From what we understand, the bombing must stop now because what will happen to our houses? Most of us ask each other whenever we see each other in the evacuation area or barangay hall, ‘Why don’t they stop the bombing? There is no more enemy. Or even if there are enemies still, there are too few of them.

All the forces of the military are there. Why do they use bombs? Do they want to destroy all the houses in Marawi? Why don’t they use their armor or face-to-face fighting? Why are they using bombs?… We hope they put an end to the bombing.

We hope they put an end to Martial Law. Because we Muslims suffer … Yes, you give us relief. But, we can’t taste the food because of the difficulties … My kids, my neighbors, everybody has a stomach ache. (Some have been hospitalized. My kid is in the hospital now.)

What else are we waiting for? I hope the tribe will unite. .. What will happen to us? Will we become beggars? I hope we have teamwork. If we don’t help each other out, we will suffer more. Thank you to the nuns and the groups who are helping in this. I hope Pres. Duterte will end Martial Law because we are truly suffering from it. (

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