Moro clan members resolving conflicts after Cotabato gunfight

COTABATO CITY — Members of the Sinsuat clan in Cotabato and in Maguindanao del Norte, made estranged by hostile politics, are optimistic that they can still reunite despite Tuesday’s gunfight that marred their reconciliation dialogue. It left a policeman dead.

The Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region and the Cotabato City Police Office are keen on prosecuting to the fullest extent of law the 10 individuals implicated in the atrocity. Four of them were already arrested at the scene while six more nabbed in pursuit operations held on the same day.

Datu Bimbo Sinsuat, clan leader, told reporters on Friday that the incident has not dampened their zeal to continue exhausting means of putting closure to their misunderstandings that were triggered by political differences during the 2022 local elections.

“We will do our best to resolve our differences,” said Sinsuat, a former member of the Sangguniang Panlalawigan of Maguindanao that got divided as Maguindanao del Sur and Maguindanao del Norte though a plebiscite last year.

The Sinsuats rule the vote-rich Datu Odin Sinsuat town in Maguindanao del Norte, about 40 kilometers south of Cotabato City. The municipality, originally named Dinaig, was created on Aug. 18, 1947 through an executive order by then President Manuel Roxas. It has around 60,000 voters, according to barangay officials. 

Clan leaders, among them Datu Bimbo, his younger brother, Datu Ronnie, who was former Maguindanao del Norte congressional representative, and their nephew, Datu Lester, who is incumbent mayor of Datu Odin Sinsuat, were in a meeting at Barangay Rosary Heights 6 in Cotabato City last Tuesday when gunshots reverberated through the surroundings, disrupting their supposed talk on putting closure to the conflicts that have fragmented them.

Brig. Gen. Allan Nobleza, director of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region and Cotabato City’s police director, Col. Querubin Manalang Jr. had separately told reporters that the incident involved a group led by another Sinsuat clan member.

One from the group shot dead a policeman, Staff Sgt. Zahraman Mustapha Diocolono, who was positioned near the gate of the compound along