COTABATO CITY (MindaNews / 12 November) – Muslim and Christian alumni of the Catholic-run Notre Dame of Dulawan (NDD) High School in Datu Piang, Maguindanao del Sur have expressed willingness to help rebuild an old convent razed by fire Friday night.
Hanalyn Sandatu-Piang, NDD alumni president, said they will solicit suggestions from members during a meeting slated today, Sunday, at the NDD campus.
Alumni will gather Sunday in the school for the opening of a Muslim prayer room building.
Bangsamoro Member of Parliament Sittie Fahani Uy-Oyod, a lawyer and niece of Sandatu-Piang, was expected to grace the event. She is also an alumna of NDD.
Mastura Samayatin, a carpenter and an NDD alumnus, said that Muslim and Christian residents rushed to rescue from the fire three Oblates of Notre Dame (OND) nuns who live in the convent.
He said he informed the municipal fire station about the blaze with barely a text left of his mobile phone load.
Authorities were still investigating the origin of the fire that took place slightly past 7:00 p.m.
Teacher Honey Grace Tolentino said “Alhamdulillah” (all praises to God) that Sister Marilou Tolentino and the two other nuns escaped unscathed from the fire.
“Though, sadly, nothing had been salvaged of their important household and personal belongings. But we’re thankful to God that all the three sisters are safe,” she added.
Built of hard lumber, the two-story convent was constructed in the administration of the American and European Maryknoll Sisters led by American-Irish Sister Patricia Marie Callan, MM. They took over the local government-run Dulawan District High School in Poblacion Datu Piang town in 1954, during the term of Mayor Datu Mentang P. Samama, father of incumbent Mayor Victor Samama.
Some of the pioneering leaders of the Moro secessionist movement in the late 60’s were Sister Patricia’s former students.
The OND Sisters took over in 1977, after a year-long closure following a grenade attack on one of its classrooms on June 14, 1976, which killed seven students – mostly Muslims – and injured 34 others.
The ancestors of Datu Piang’s Christian residents were among Mindanao’s first wave of settlers from the north. They were beneficiaries of the Osmeña Colony Act passed by the Philippine Commission in 1913, and which was implemented from 1914 to 1935 when the term of the Department of Mindanao and Sulu ended.
The Commonwealth legislature then passed the Quirino-Recto Colonization Act of 1936, which was subsequently enforced by executive orders issued by the administration of President Ramon Magsaysay on the specific technical designations of settlements, including the EDCOR and NARRA Settlements. (Nash B. Maulana / MindaNews contributor)