"Let's Commemorate the Heroism of the Fallen 44"
Three years ago today, a miserable news has stunned the entire nation when an incident known as the Mamasapano Clash happened on January 25, 2015 at Tukanalipao, Mamasapano in Maguindanao between the Special Action Force (SAF) of the Philippine National Police against the joint forces of Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
The mission of the said police operation was to supposedly capture or in a worst case scenario, to kill the FBI’s most wanted terrorist Zulkifli Abdhir who was said to be hiding in the turf of the BIFF. Zulkifli Abdhir, also known as Marwan was a Malaysian terrorist and an expert bomb-maker who was wanted for supplying various terrorist groups around the world with bombs.
The incident was believed to have occurred at dawn, but was transmitted to the SAF Director at 6:18 AM. Although the mission was successfully executed, it led to the deaths of 44 SAF members when a firefight between the forces of the Government against BIFF and MILF broke out.
Prior to the Mamasapano incident, SAF initially raided Marwan’s hut and killed the infamous terrorist when he attempted to fight back the Government forces. The shooting alerted the BIFF and the MILF near the area. This resulted to heavy firefight between two opposing forces.
Even though the SAF troops failed to take Marwan’s body due to heavy firefight; the FBI had confirmed on February 4 on that same year that the Philippine’s Special Action Force have successfully taken down Marwan during that day when the DNA sample taken on Marwan’s dead body matched with his brother who was detained in US facility.
With Marwan’s confirmed death, the mission was declared successful even though the Special Action Force of the Philippines National Policed sacrificed 44 lives. The BIFF and MILF have also confirmed 18 deaths on their side. At least 5 civilians were also killed during the bloody incident.
The clash has been dubbed as the biggest loss of government elite force in history. The incident also caused the Philippine Congress to halt the passage of Bangsamoro Basic Law, effectively endangering the peace process between the government and the MILF. Source Wikipedia.
The Mamasapano clash was heavily debated whether the incident was a mis-encounter or a massacre. According to the Philippine Senate, the incident was overkill and that it would be wrong to label it as a mis-encounter due to the manner that the 44 SAF personnel were killed.
However, the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines led by Loretta Rosales insisted that the incident was a mis-encounter. She added that the two opposing forces never intended to fight each other and that the SAF troops were also armed and not helpless. But I don’t want to spark any dispute here so I don’t want to make any comment.
But what I want to express is to at least commemorate the heroism of our fallen 44 heroes! Today marks their 3rd death anniversary and I am asking you to stop what you are doing and offer a moment of silence and prayers for the greatest sacrifice done by our fallen 44.
Let’s stop blaming and instead let’s keep their memories alive! God bless the Philippines.
Reference:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mamasapano_clash
