BAUKO, Mountain Province – Presidential Peace Adviser Carlito Galvez, Jr. assured provincial and municipal officials of Mountain Province and Kalinga and elders of the Betwagan and Butbut tribes that the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unification (OPAPRU) will support the ongoing initiatives to settle the decades old conflict.
Galvez, who was the guest of honor and speaker during the 36th anniversary of the historic Mount Data ‘sipat’ or exchange of peace tokens between the Philippine government represented by the late President Corazon C. Aquino and the Cordillera Bodong Administration – Cordillera Peoples Liberation Army (CBA-CPLA), stated that the OPAPRU will extend whatever appropriate assistance to the concerned stakeholders for the achievement of lasting peace in the 2 remote communities located within the boundary of the 2 involved provinces.
He disclosed that OPAPRU officials, including himself, are willing to visit the areas of the 2 tribes to assure the elders and the members of the tribes that there will be brighter prospects for development once they will put an end to the ongoing dispute that traces back over 2 decades ago.
Galvez also assured his support to the implementation of various peace and development projects of concerned government agencies and the local governments that are being currently implemented in the areas occupied by both tribes but it is important that lasting peace should prevail to allow people to freely move around and interact with members of the other tribe for the benefit of growth and progress in their respective communities.
Gov. Bonifacio C. Lacwasan, Jr and Kalinga Gov. James Edduba lauded the gesture of Secretary Galvez in expressing his all-out support to the realization of lasting peace between the Betwagan and Butbut tribes and his decision to visit the areas occupied by the two tribes which shows the government’s firm commitment to peacefully settle conflicts.
Lacwasan claimed that on the part of Mountain Province officials and elders of the Betwagan Tribe, they are ready anytime to meet with their counterparts from Kalinga and the Butbut Tribe to extensively discuss feasible solutions that will be presented because they value the importance of peace in charting the growth and development of big and small communities.
For his part, Edduba emphasized that the provincial government intends to invite Secretary Galvez to be personally present in the annual celebration of the province’s Bodong festival for him to appreciate the age-old and time-honored practice of ‘bodong’ in the settlement of conflicts.
Some tribes of Mountain province and Kalinga still adhere to the age-old and time-honored tradition of ‘bodong’ in settling inter-tribal disputes that paved the way for the achievement of lasting peace among tribes that had been engaged in past disputes that resulted to the loss of lives and damage to properties.
The OPAPRU spearheaded the simple but meaningful activities to celebrate the historic Mount Data ‘sipat’ as a constant reminder to the people that the Cordillera hosted one of the important events in the country’s rich history that ended some of the brewing hostilities in the region at that time.