Proposed Maguindanao farm airstrip to service Japanese, Arab traders: Datu Ali Midtimbang

Maguindanao gubernatorial candidate Datu Ali Midtimbang inspects banana and palm plantations in Talayan town. (Mindanao Examiner Photo - Mark Navales)

MAGUINDANAO - Maguindanao gubernatorial candidate Datu Ali Midtimbang, a former Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) leader-turned-businessman, has unveiled a multi-million peso plan to build an airstrip in Talayan town for easy transport of agricultural products to its local and international markets.

Midtimbang said their partners and investors from Unifrutti Philippines, Japan and Arab countries have already inspected the site which is being envisioned to serve small non-commercial air crafts mostly to ferry agricultural goods. He said the construction of the airstrip would be financed by their foreign traders’ and partners, but the local government will have to put up a counterpart of 10 million to 20 million under the so-called build-operate-transfer scheme. The facility is expected to be finished in 2017.

“We have an airport in Datu Odin Sinsuat town, but the businessmen wanted to get the products closer to the town itself. The time is very important to them (traders). Recently, they scouted an area. We are looking forward it will come to pass within the year,” Midtimbang said.

Talayan is a rich, fertile land in Maguindanao, one of five provinces under the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao which has seen its share of conflicts from decades of Muslim insurgency to clans locked in a brutal cycle of revenge killings or locally known as rido. Despite the violence, locals have managed to produce export quality banana, mangoes and even palm trees for the past three years, according to Midtimbang.

He said some 100 hectares of land are now planted to mangoes and another 2,000 hectares are allocated to banana farms and all their produce go to the Japanese and Saudi markets with the proceeds helping former MNLF combatants, as well as the displaced population, to economically recover.

“This plan is favorable to us because it will generate more jobs for our people. If all of us will work hard, nobody will suffer starvation,” Midtimbang, said.

Talayan is a 4th class municipality, and according to the 2010 census, it has a population of 16,042 people in 4,758 households. Most of the population rely on agriculture for subsistence, but peace dividends are slowly being reaped as former combatants turn in their guns for plows.

“If we can have this project, it will eventually help in changing the image of Maguindanao too,” Midtimbang said.

Maguidnanao is prey to groups known as "lost commands," former Moro guerrillas that are no longer under the control of their superiors and engage in banditry and ransom kidnappings. Regular eruptions of violence have forced hundreds of thousands of residents from their homes. Many return fairly quickly, only to be displaced again. The cycle of violence also leads to massive displacements, disrupting lives.

“If you give the people jobs, they themselves will guard their own community. We have tested that as our banana and mango plantation have generated at least 600 jobs so far,” Midtimbang said.

Midtimbang knows from where he speaks. He said he turned over his firearms to the government in support to peace and exchange his weapons for a piece of land to till. He has also become an influential community leader who led his people in transforming idle lands to productive farms.

He has hired former rebels too in his plantation, with their wives helping out to augment incomes that have taken a hit from the conflict as well as the heat wave caused by the El Nino phenomenon, which had transformed farm lands into dried up, cracked fields.

“This is better than not doing anything at home. At least, I help augment the family income to be able to send my two children to school,” said Johana Balabara, 36.

Balabara earns 235 pesos a day as a farm produce picker, more than average in a country where the minimum daily wage remains below that in poor provinces. She also gets overtime pay and other fringe benefits.

Once the airstrip is built, Balabara said she is optimistic that it would also lead to an increase in farm production, and ultimately more people will be given jobs and put an end to the devastating cycle of poverty in Maguindanao. (Mark Navales)

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