By Ira Karen Apanay, http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2009/aug/20/yehey/prov/20090820pro1....

A NON-GOVERNMENT organization and Lumad communities on Wednesday condemned the military’s occupation in Manobo communities and schools in Lianga, Surigao del Sur, and called for the immediate pull-out of more than 200 military forces in the area.

“We condemn the military’s occupation of Lumad communities and schools. We demand that the military leave the ancestral domain of the Manobos and indemnify them of the damages done to their households and school,” said Sophia Garduce, spokesperson of SALINLAHI Alliance for Children’s Concerns.

SALINLAHI said almost 2,000 Lumad civilians, 948 are children, from 15 communities decided to evacuate for fear of their safety when over 200 combined elements of the 48th Infantry Battalion and 36th Infantry Battalion under the 401st Infantry Division arrived and started to occupy their houses, or set up camp in their backyards and under their houses.

In June, Garduce said that government troops led by the 401st Infantry Division swooped down on a Manobo community in Lianga, Surigao del Sur, forcing the whole village to evacuate because of fear for their own lives.

Garduce said that the military set up a monitoring post in front of the elementary school grounds set up by the Tribal Filipino Program of Surigao del Sur and the Lumad boarding school of the Alternative Learning Center for Agricultural Development.

“They demanded from the school teachers a complete list of its students claiming that it is an ‘NPA [New People’s Army] training school.’ They later occupied the school and used it as their barracks,” Garduce said.

Garduce said the Tribal Filipino Program of Surigao del Sur is a model alternative education program that won the National Literacy Award of the Department of Education in 2001.

The first community that left their houses in June, the group has sought refuge at the Lianga Gym and evacuees from 14 other communities followed.

However, the group said that on July 18, because of continued military harassments to the evacuees, the council of elders representing all the communities decided to depart the gym and seek refuge at the municipal center of Tandag, Surigao del Sur.

At present, they are occupying the grounds of the Diocesan Pastoral Center . All 948 children evacuees were forced to stop schooling.

Because of this, the Manobos stopped visiting their farm lots as a consequence of the military presence, affecting their household sustenance, Garduce said.

“We call on all concerned Filipinos to support the Surigao evacuees and add their voice to the clamor for military troops pull out, as well as contribute to the generation of relief such as food, medicines and clothes for the evacuees,” she added.