By LITO RULONA
Correspondent
“WE are just missionaries who are spreading the good news of Islam.”
With this, Amerodin Unte called on local Muslim leaders to help him and his group in what appeared to be a case of profiling of Muslim Filipinos as terrorists. Speaking on behalf of his group, he maintained their innocence.
Authorities found nothing against Unte and members of his group except that they appeared nervous, supposedly failed to properly answer questions about their religion and allegedly had fake IDs, and they wore Muslim clothing.
The Coast Guard couldn’t even call them suspects, but authorities arrested them anyway at the pier in Macabalan on Monday night for merely being “persons of interest.”
On Wednesday afternoon, the five “persons of interest,” who are in their twenties, were charged with falsification of documents or, specifically, for allegedly having fake IDs before the City Prosecutor’s Office.
Charged together with Unte were Alinor Dimaporo, Bashit Unte, Abubacar Ibrahim and Abdel Cali Hamid, all from strike-torn Marawi City.
At presstime, the men are still being held by the Coast Guard but they were supposed to be handed over to the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG).
Coast Guard district commander Leovigildo Panopio said the CIDG was checking if the group has links to the Maute Group in Marawi City.
On Monday, Panopio said, authorities became suspicious and confronted the men who apparently became nervous as they were approaching an xay machine.
Their cellphones were seized for examination.
Panopio said the suspects claimed to be Muslim missionaries on the way to Manila but when confronted, they allegedly failed to recite their basic teachings.
He said the “persons of interest” also allegedly presented fake IDs. According to the Coast Guard official, all five allegedly admitted to faking their IDs.
He said authorities did not find weapons or anything illegal in the belongings of the five men. None bore wounds or showed signs of injury resulting from fightings.
Also, none of the “persons of interest” were in the arrest order of Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana.
But Panopio said the Coast Guard still could not discount the possibility that the men had links or could be sympathizers of the Maute Group.
“It is now up to the prosecutor’s office to file appropriate charges against them,” said Panopio.
Unte strongly denied any wrongdoing even as he frowned over suspicions that they had terrorist links, maintaining that they were merely missionaries who were headed to Manila in order to “spread the good news of Islam.”
He said their plan was to go to Baclaran in Pasay to meet with other Muslim leaders there after doing the rounds in Mindanao where they taught Islam in various places.
Meanwile, the Coast Guard on Wednesday also pressed rebellion charges against a group of Maute Group suspects who ere arrested inside a Manila-based vessel during a separate operation in Iloilo.
The suspects–Ijajid Pangumping Romato, 20 from Sabayle, Iligan City; Farida Pangumping Romato, 23 of Carmen, Cagayan de Oro; and Abdulrahman Serd Dimakutah, 25, of Marawi City–were charged before a Camp Evangelista-based panel of prosecutors.
The three were arrested by the Coast Guard in Iloilo City on Sunday while they were on board M/V St. Therese of Child Jesus by 2Go Travel.
The vessel was bound to Manila from Cagayan de Oro, and stopped over in Iloilo.
Panopio said they have evidence that the suspects are members of the Maute Group and were involved in the Marawi crisis that started in May 23.
Farida, he said, is a sister of the Mautes.
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