Arroyo’s pet monsters

Friend or foe: Arroyo’s pet monsters
by Mark Willacy
from ABC, North Asia

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/04/06/2864692.htm

Mark Willacy with the Philippine’s Bravo Company approach a village known to be home to Ampatuan supporters. (ABC News: Mark Willacy)
For centuries Mindanao in the Philippines has been called the Land of Promise. But in recent years it’s become notorious for promising, and delivering, a stomach-turning array of bombings, beheadings and bloodshed.

This is an island infested with Islamic insurgents, Communist guerrillas, separatist rebels, and feudal warlords – men who control vast private armies and even more portentous arsenals. As one Filipino joked to me, on Mindanao there are more unregistered guns than registered voters. Unfortunately the joke is true, and thousands have died as a result.

This jagged island in the southern Philippines is also infamous for being a slaughterhouse for journalists. That’s what drew Foreign Correspondent to Mindanao to begin with – the biggest massacre of reporters in recorded history. It was a crime that exposed the putrid and some say corrupt policies of the Philippines government – because, as we found, this was a massacre allegedly carried out by close friends of the president.

It had been years since the ABC had been to Mindanao. Going to this island was like voyaging into the mythical heart of darkness without a map, into a wilderness crawling with bloodthirsty killers straight out of Conrad’s novella. I would soon meet Mindanao’s very own Kurtz – a man mad with power, protected by fanatical warriors prepared to kill at his behest.

Andal ‘Lolo’ Ampatuan had only made it to grade three. But what he lacked in formal education he more than made up for with Machiavellian cunning. Famed for his frontier-style brutality, Lolo rose to be the governor of the western province of Maguindanao. Once in power he began to fill every position – from police chief to pot-hole filler – with his equally uneducated relatives.

At last count there were 44 officials in Maguindanao with the surname Ampatuan. Lolo’s burgeoning political clout soon caught the attention of the president in Manila. Gloria Arroyo would become firm friends with the Ampatuans, who were in turn nicknamed the president’s “pet monsters”. These monsters from Mindanao would tear Mrs Arroyo’s opponents to pieces – in 2004 Lolo helped the president hang on to power by delivering her 99-per cent of the votes in his fiefdom. From then on Lolo Ampatuan was unstoppable, transforming himself from a backwoods thug to a frontline warlord.

Gloria Arroyo always pays her political debts. Under her administration, the Ampatuans would be rewarded handsomely in cash, guns, and ammunition. They would soon boast 20 mansions dotted over the island – these obscene white-washed fortresses were often built next door to the stinking slums of Lolo’s unfortunate subjects.

“The Ampatuans are worth $300 million,” lieutenant-general Raymundo Ferrer told me.

The top military officer in Mindanao, he’s watched Gloria Arroyo’s “pet monsters” turn on their keepers. I asked the general where all the money came from.

“The government,” he replied.

It was general Ferrer’s task to turn the Ampatuans from a yokel militia into uniformed comrades-in-arms, to help the Philippines military fight a mutual enemy – the separatist guerillas of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. But when the MILF and the government began talking peace last year, Lolo and his legion of armed thugs had nothing to do and no-one to kill. But on November 23, 2009 a whole convoy of people would drive right into the Ampatuan heart of darkness, and they would pay with their lives.

Like Lolo Ampatuan, Toto Mangudadatu is a Mindanao warlord – although, he’s not in the same league as the old man. Once, these two clans were allies. But then the Ampatuans and the Mangudadatus had a falling out. So Toto did the unthinkable, and decided to run for governor. But to do that he had to lodge his candidacy papers in the heart of Ampatuan territory.

Fearing he’d be killed for his treachery, he sent along his wife and some female relatives to submit his papers. In Mindanao culture, women are supposed to be immune from attack. This was a big news story, so more than 30 journalists joined the convoy. Reporters too are meant to be off-limits.

At nine o’clock on the morning of November 23 last year, the seven cars and vans set out. About an hour later they were stopped at a checkpoint by more than 100 armed supporters of Lolo Ampatuan, including uniformed police. They were then ordered to drive to a remote hilltop where all 58 of them were massacred.

“I told him you don’t have to go there, it’s very dangerous. Especially the place, the Ampatuans… I really miss him so much. Very, very much.” Myrna Reblando wipes her eyes with a white handkerchief.

Her husband Bong Reblando was a respected Mindanao journalist. He was in the convoy that November day. A gunman, allegedly belonging to the Ampatuan militia, shot Bong Reblando in the face. Some of the Mangudadatu women were shot in the groin before being finished off. Some of the bodies were then crushed into giant pits. Others were left where they fell.

Winding our way up the dirt road towards that lonely hilltop I imagined what was going through the heads of those journalists. Why didn’t they jump from their vehicles and run? There was plenty of scrub and long grass they could hide in. Did they think they were merely going to be chastised and then released by this bunch of armed goons?

Escorting us to the massacre site was a unit of Philippines soldiers bristling with high powered rifles. As we filmed, army snipers would peer through their sights spotting for Ampatuan militiamen in the valleys below. This is still dangerous territory. Despite rounding up hundreds of Lolo’s men after the massacre, the military says there are at least a thousand of his supporters on the run – most are armed and dangerous. But Lolo is ailing and detained.

“I will walk you to the hospital, but I will not go in,” general Ferrer ushered me towards the hospital at his army camp in General Santos City. It is clear the general doesn’t want to be seen or filmed anywhere near his most notorious inmate. But Lolo isn’t inside the hospital. He’s enjoying the sun in a gazebo outside, surrounded by fawning family and friends. I walk up to him and introduce myself. I am the first journalist allowed to meet the warlord since his arrest. He looks a little stunned.

“No questions about the charges or what happened that day,” warns one of his grandsons, a chubby young man with a bum-fluff moustache. So I start off with some small talk.

“How’s your health?”

But Lolo is playing the Godfather, keeping his mouth shut and leaving it to his family to do all the talking.

“He has high blood pressure,” answers a man behind me.

“His heart is not so good,” says a woman sitting opposite.

Eventually cameraman Wayne McAllister reminds me why we are here and I ask the question Lolo Ampatuan doesn’t want to hear, let alone answer. Is he confident that he can defend the murder charges against him?

Lolo mumbles something. His grandson answers for him. “Definitely.”

So what does he make of the charges against him?

“They are only rumours,” says his grandson. “There is no evidence to the charges they have filed [against] my grandfather.”

So why would his allies in the government do it?

“We don’t know.”

I prod further. The prosecutors say they have all the evidence they need to convict him.

The woman pipes up again. “They want to [bring] our Lolo down… but they can’t because our Lolo is very strong.”

Up in Manila, those in power are aware of just how strong Lolo remains. The Philippines defence secretary, Norberto Gonzales, tells me he worries that the Ampatuan Godfather may even buy his way out of jail.

“I can say that we cannot guarantee that that will not happen. Given the situation in the Philippines, these things do happen. I cannot deny those cases.”

Already the Philippines media is reporting that the Ampatuans are funneling hush money to witnesses to the massacre. Those who don’t or won’t take this blood money are intimidated, or worse.

“Some [witnesses] are even being killed. We know the consequences. This is a very serious case for us,” says defence secretary Gonzales.

Under the Arroyo administration, warlords like Lolo Ampatuan have been empowered by government guns and engorged by public money. Now, only the Philippines’ enfeebled justice system stands between Lolo and impunity. For some, the warlord’s blood money will never buy justice.

“For me, money is nothing if your husband is murdered,” says Myrna Reblando.

“I will not accept money if they tell me that I [must] stop seeking for justice. No way.”

Mark Willacy is the ABC’s North Asia correspondent.

His report can be seen on the Foreign Correspondent website.