HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
Orphaned by War

Cheryl Munsalod, 11, left for a camping trip and came home two days later to find her family dead. Her parents were former NPA guerrillas who, wanting to start a new life, went back to their hometown. Cheryl and her family however found not a fresh start but constant fear and, in the end, death.

By MARS S. MARATA
Bulatlat

JOSEFINA, Zamboanga del Sur – Cheryl Munsalod, 11, enjoyed herself immensely at the two-day Girl Scout camping activity at her school that ended Dec. 4. She was eager to tell her scouting adventure to her father Eleazar, mother Concepcion and younger brother Dodong Charlie, who were all waiting for her back home on an upland village called Calabat, in this province of southern Philippines.

When she reached Calabat, she saw villagers congregated at a neighbor’s house by the village road. They all seemed teary-eyed, staring at her approach. When she arrived at their hut, she saw her parents and brother lying on the ground, cold and lifeless. As Cheryl repeatedly cried "Tatay, Nanay, Dodong...." (Father, Mother, Dodong…), the neighbors, her playmates and other villagers cried and sobbed with her.

"This is a respected family in the barrio. People here love them," said village councilor Sonny Lumangcag, himself fighting back his tears.

The killing

Cheryl still could not believe nor understand what happened to her family.

At dawn of Dec. 4, six men, five of them in military uniform armed with M-14, M16, M-203 and .45 caliber pistol, and the other in civilian clothes wearing a ski mask, were seen outside Cheryl’s family hut where the victims slept. Witnesses saw them firing at the house.

After several minutes of continuous firing, they saw the men left, taking the village road. They found the victims lying dead. 

Eleazar, 48, sustained 12 gunshot wounds; Concepcion, 39, had three wounds on the chest; and Charlie, 10, bore seven wounds. Eighteen empty shells of .45 caliber pistol were recovered from the crime scene.

Former rebel leaders

The police could not explain to innocent Cheryl why her family was killed.

But Cheryl's parents, had they known they would be killed that morning, would probably not be surprised. Eleazar in particular, according to close kin, sensed few weeks earlier that "somebody from the government" was out to get them. This, according to him, was in relation to their being former guerilla leaders in Lanao areas.

According to their relatives, the couple left the New People’s Army (NPA) in 2001 to lead a "peaceful life," deciding to live in Josefina, Eleazar's hometown. Sensing though that their safety was still at risk, they formalized their "surrender" with the local police and the military. Last month in fact, they obtained "clearance" from the authorities.

The couple's anxiety may have lessened after being "cleared." This sense of security may have also been fortified by the fact that their hut is located in the middle of two detachments of the Army’s 10th Infantry Battalion.

But, neighbors asked, who would dare kill them in a place where the number of government soldiers almost equal the number of the villagers? For almost a year now, soldiers of the 10th, 5th and 4th Infantry Battalions have been dispatching Reengineered Special Operations Teams (RSOTs) in the border barangays (villages) of Zamboanga del Sur, Misamis Occidental, Zamboanga del Norte and Zamboanga Sibugay.

The RSOTs have reportedly been conducting house-to-house census, recruiting villagers for the paramilitary Citizens Armed Force Geographical Unit (CAFGU), and organizing barangay intelligence units. Medical and dental operations accompany the military operations. Bulatlat

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