Biography of a Prominent Filipino

Biography of Macli-ing Dulag

Macliing Dulag also spelt Macli-ing, Macli'ing; c. 1930 – 24 April 1980) was a
Kalinga leader of the Butbut tribe in the Cordillera Administrative Region on
the island of Luzon in the Philippines, who was assassinated for his
opposition to the Chico River Dam Project.
Dulag was a chieftain in the highland village of Bugnay,
Tinglayan, Kalinga-Apayao. A farmer by profession, Dulag was also a
road maintenance worker for the Department of Public Works and
Highways. He staunchly opposed construction of the Chico Dam, a
hydroelectric project along the Chico River proposed by President
Ferdinand E. Marcos' government and was to be funded by the World
Bank.
Indigenous peoples in the area, including the Kalinga and the Bontoc,
resisted the project for three decades as the proposed dam's reservoir
threatened to drown 1,400 square-kilometres of traditional highland
villages and ancestral domains in the modern-day provinces of
Mountain Province, Kalinga and Apayao.
On 24 April 1980, elements from 4th Infantry Division of the
Philippine Army opened fire on Dulag at his home, killing him and
wounding a companion. His murder unified the various peoples of the
Cordillera Mountains against the proposed dam, causing both the
World Bank and the
Marcos regime to
eventually abandon the
project a few years after.
Commemoration
The date of Dulag's
death is unofficially
observed as "Cordillera
Day" annually by
indigenous communities
along the Chico River.
Dulag's name is also
inscribed in the Bantayog
ng mga Bayani (Monument of the Heroes) in Quezon City, Metro
Manila, which is dedicated to victims of extrajudicial killings since the
Martial Law era.
 Macli-ing as the Cordilleran Defender
To the Marcos dictatorship, the indigenous communities of the Cordillera
mountain range in the north of Luzon could easily be dealt with as it
proceeded with its plan to build a huge dam on the Chico River.
But the Kalinga and Bontok peoples knew that the project would flood their
ricefields and their homes, communal forests and sacred burial grounds. It
would destroy their lives by changing their environment forever.
Macliing Dulag was a respected elder of the Butbut tribe in the
tiny mountain village of Bugnay in the 1960s. He was a pangat, one
of those listened to by the community because of their wisdom and
courage. He was also the elected barrio captain of Bugnay, serving
out three terms since 1966. Ordinarily, he tended his rice fields and
worked as a laborer on road maintenance projects (earning P405 a
month).
In 1974, the regime tried to implement a 1,000-megawatt
hydroelectric power project, to be funded by the World Bank, along
the Chico River. The plan called for the construction of four dams that
would have put many villages under water, covering an area of
around 1,400 square kilometers of rice terraces (payew), orchards,
and graveyards. As many as 100,000 people living along the river,
including Macliing’s Bugnay village, would have lost their homes.
Macliing became a strong and articulate figure in this struggle which
pitted small nearly powerless communities in the Cordilleras against
the full powers of the martial law regime. Kalinga and Bontok leaders
were offered bribes, harassed by soldiers and government
mercenaries, even imprisoned. But the anti-dam leaders, including
Macliing, stayed firm in their opposition to the project. They argued
that development should not be achieved at such extreme sacrifice.

“If you destroy life in your search for what you say is the good
life, we question it,” Macliing said”. Those who need electric lights are
not thinking of us who are bound to be destroyed. Should the need
for electric power be a reason for our death?”

Macliing expressed the people’s reverence for the land,

affirming their right to stay: “Such arrogance to say that you own the
land, when you are owned by it! How can you own that which outlives
you? Only the people own the land because only the people live
forever. To claim a place is the birthright of everyone. Even the lowly
animals have their own place…how much more when we talk of
human beings?”
Resistance to the dam project unified the Cordillera region.
Macliing and other Cordillera leaders initiated a series of tribal pacts
(bodong or vochong), which helped cement this unity and create a
very broad alliance of the communities and their supporters. They
recognized the leader of the Butbut as their spokesperson, for
although Macliing had had no formal education, he always found the
right words for what they needed to say.
Macliing was murdered by government soldiers on April 24, 1980.
They surrounded his house one night and sprayed it with bullets. His
assassination merely solidified opposition to the dam and won it
sympathizers from all over the country and even abroad. Even the
World Bank, which would have funded the dam construction,
withdrew from the project, finally forcing the martial law government
to cancel its plans.
Four of Macliing’s killers were charged and in 1983 tried before
a military tribunal. An army lieutenant and a sergeant were
subsequently found guilty of murder and frustrated murder. The
lieutenant was later reinstated in the army, rose to become a major,
and then himself was killed in 2000 by the New People’s Army.