Surviving Marawi: Cagayanons recount ordeal

By BENCYRUS ELLORIN
Special to the Gold Star Daily

THEIR story is cut out for an action movie, only that there is no take two.

Two Cagayanons, a 35-year-old teacher and a 19-year-old driver, made a living in Marawi City. The former was teaching math in a private school in the city by the lake while the other worked as family driver of the school owner.

On May 23, 2017, they were told to pack their things and get ready to evacuate. But as soon as they hit the streets, black hooded men accosted them and locked in an abandoned warehouse.

“Murag bodega sa bugas man to,” recalled Brian, the teacher. There were 19 of them, captured from other parts of city, locked in that warehouse.

A short lecture on their plans for Mindanao, then they were asked to recite some prayers. What their plan was about, Brian cannot remember. To him it was just mumble. The real thing came when they were asked to recite a prayer. Not all of them were able to recite.

One claimed to be “balik Islam” but when he was asked to recite a Muslim prayer, he could not. According to witnesses, the decision was quick. One quick strike of a sword decapitated his head. Then one of the masked men displayed it to them, saying, “This will happen to you if you do not tell the truth.”

Later on, they were asked to bury the unfortunate person.

After their first night, one of the hooded men came in to take a video of one of them, supposedly to beg for help and ask President Duterte to stop military operations so the lives of the civilian captives will be saved. Brian was chosen because he was the most articulate among them.

In the video that surfaced online on May 30, 2017 and started getting viral and attracted news reports the next, Brian Edrote, 35, was appealing for help, asking Duterte to stop military operations and appealing to officials of his hometown Cagayan de Oro to find ways of saving them.

Obviously, by the time the video, supposedly, a proof of life, spread on cyberworld, they were already on their way to freedom.

“We [did] not have a sense of time,” Freddie said in Cebuano. But he recalled their situation changed after the fourth night. They were awakened by explosions supposedly from government choppers and staccato from their captors’ rifles and machine guns.

“It was the third bomb, I think, that hit the metal roll-up doors of the bodega,” recalled Freddie. When they peeked, they saw one of their guards sprawled in a pool blood on the ground. They saw another scamper away on board a motorcycle. The upper portion of the warehouse, the hooded fighters were busy firing at attacking choppers.

A day or two earlier, Freddie recalls their conversation with fellow captives. It was then that they agreed to fight it out or escape if given a chance than get beheaded.

“We are innocent,” he said.

Upon seeing light, with the roll-up doors of warehouse partially pried open by government bombs, they summoned their collective will to escape. They, 18 of them, quickly opened the metal doors then ran to a nearby bridge and jumped onto the waters.

They thought that going with the downstream would lead them outside of Marawi. They were right, but their sense of direction lost, they were feed to the Lanao Lake. From there, they looked for other streams or rivers and they found one that would wash them down to Saguiaran town, Lanao del Sur.

Brian and Freddie were not swimmers, but they decided to take the riverine route. Others in their group, 12 of them took the land route. Because they are none swimmers, they held on to anything near the river bank. Two of their companions who were swimmers tried to swim in the violent rapids and vanished.

Freddie said they survived on papaya. “When we thought it was safe, we crawled up the riverbank to look for food,” Freddie recalled.

After three nights, they reached a portion of the river that was calm. “It was waist deep near the river bank, recalled Brian, “It was very calm,” recalled Brian.

They must be above Agus II, one of the seven hydro electric plants in the Lake Lanao Agus Hydro Electric Complex. It is located five kilometers from Marawi. Wading past the calm waters would have been fatal as it would lead them to the water outfalls of the hydro electric plant.

Believing they were outside Marawi already, they, four of them, explored land after three days. They found people who were like them, running for dear lives. It was a good thing, Brian remembered the telephone number of their boss. They looked around for anyone who had a phone to place call to their employer. It was already May 31, a full week after they saw death.

By this time, the video appeal of Brian was going viral, with Cagayan de Oro news outfits pounding on the news. According to CDOdev.com, as of May 31, Brian’s video had gotten 174,000 views and 2,278 shares. Unknown to the public, when the video got viral, Brian and three of his co-captives were already on their way to freedom.

They were advised by their employer to stay put as he is on his way fetch them. He arrived in the afternoon. Two of their companions were sent to their families in Lanao del Norte. Brian and Freddie rode with their boss, whose family is also seeking refuge, to Cagayan de Oro. They arrived in Cagayan de Oro early morning of June 1.

Upon learning of the viral video and their escape, Mayor Oscar Moreno, instructed City Social Welfare and Development Officer Teddy Sabugaa to locate the two Cagayanons, to secure them and take care of their welfare.

Brian was located by a team from city hall and the city police in a residential compound in Canitoan together with his employer. Freddie on the other hand sneaked out and went to his father’s home after giving a television station an interview.

At city hall, Brian was attended to by paramedics, social workers and psychologists who immediately checked on his health and psychological status. Brian seemed okay. He can walk limping and complained of body pains – as a result of several rifle butt strokes his captors gave him.

After trauma debriefing, Brian was brought to a safe location and provided with the needed medical care.

Freddie was located the next day. After undergoing trauma debriefing, he joined Brian for further care and debriefing.

Their story is a story of the human resiliency. Their gripping account of the inhumane violence that characterize the terrorist attack on Marawi City. These survivors are extra ordinary humans. Their will to live hard to surpass. Their survival is a silver lining Marawi City’s glooming horizon.