COTABATO CITY (December 8, 2025) Another group from the now both defunct Dawlah Islamiya and Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters have pledged allegiance to the government during a surrender rite in Datu Saudi Ampatuan, Maguindanao del Sur on Friday, December 5.
Major Gen. Jose Vladmir Cagara, commander of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, told reporters on Sunday that the 25 Dawlah Islamiya and BIFF members decided to avail of the 6th ID’s reconciliation program for violent religious extremists through the joint intercession of Moro local executives, Lt. Col. Anacito Naz, commanding officer of the 92nd Infantry Battalion, and his immediate superior, Col. Rommel Pagayon of the 1st Brigade Combat Team.
The 25 terrorists first turned over to Naz and Pagayon their explosives and 30 combat weapons, comprised of M16 and M14 assault rifles and long-range bolt-action sniper rifles, before they renounced their membership with the Dawlah Islamiya and BIFF at the headquarters of the 92nd IB in Barangay Salbu in Datu Saudi Ampatuan, in the presence of local executives and Islamic preachers supporting the Army’s anti-terror campaign in Maguindanao del Sur.
Two from the group, Abdul Oro Mando and Guinaid Tantung Mustapha, said the turnover of their firearms to the 92nd IB was in compliance with the Small Arms and Light Weapons Management Program of the 6th ID and the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity, a disarmament campaign being implemented in Central Mindanao in support of the national government’s peace overtures with southern Moro communities.
Four of the 25 terrorists who surrendered to the 92nd IB, Halim Undih Bansing, Modin Anto Morsid, Badruddin Egam Maniri and Mohammad Andong Katib, are known experts in fabrication of improvised explosive devices, using either ammonium nitrate, or potassium chlorate as blasting charges and rigged with blasting mechanisms that can be detonated from a distance using mobile phones.
Cagara said officials of units under the 601st Infantry Brigade and mayors in Maguindanao del Sur, among them Bassir Utto of Datu Saudi Ampatuan, were also instrumental in securing the surrender of the 25 terrorists via backchannel dialogues.
Both the BIFF and the Dawlah Islamiya are tagged in all deadly bombings in Central Mindanao from 2014 to 2018. The two terror groups also have a reputation for fomenting hatred for non-Muslims, which moderate Islamic theologians detest for being contrary to Islam’s advocacy for tolerance and interfaith solidarity.
The surrender on Friday of 25 more Dawlah Islamiya and BIFF members brought to 1,774 the total number of terrorists from both groups who have surrendered, since 2021, to units of the 6th ID, the 1st Brigade Combat Team and the Navy’s 1st Marine Brigade, which is securing parts of Maguindanao del Norte province.
Many of the former terrorists who have returned to the fold of law in the past five years are now thriving peacefully in their hometowns as workers in agricultural plantations, as drivers of passenger vehicles, as construction workers and as barangay-based entrepreneurs engaged in small and micro enterprises that government agencies helped them put up.
Each of the 25 terrorists who surrendered to the 92nd Infantry Battalion received relief supplies and cash assistance from local government officials that they can spend for their needs while still undergoing religious reorientation as prelude to their reintegration into mainstream society.
