(SDN) — Bismillahi inna lillahi wa inna lillahi rajiun!
May Allah bless the departed soul of The Princess Tarhata Lucman Alonto and keep her in Jannah for all time. She breathed her last today, Friday, February 26, 2021.
She passed on to her Creator, her heirs and relatives made known on social media, the unofficial town chronicler and herald of things.
Her demise is an added weight on the people of Marawi City, the whole People of the Lake, who are still unfairly and unjustly made to suffer owing to the impact of the siege of Marawi and the ensuing slow implementation of the city’s reconstruction and rehabilitation.
Her people, and that means the whole of the Bangsamoro community, has lost an esteemed leader, a trailblazer, a brave and courageous WOMAN!
Somebody like The Princess Tarhata Alonto Lucman deserves preserving her memory, the trails she blaze for women in leadership, particularly Moro women, her social and political achievements unprecedented in more ways than one.
The BARMM leadership, in collaboration with her home province Lanao del Sur, must and ought to build a monument for The Princess in the form of a museum for all the mementos of and in her life (surely there are countless); that’s the least the people of BARMM can and ought to fulfill posthaste.
Her memory must not be left untended for that would be a disgrace and a gross negligence, of selfishness, and an ingratitude; it would be an unforgivable negligence.
BARMM owes the princess a museum for her memorial so others may learn
The trails of leadership she blazed, paving the way for those who came and will come after her, transcended a fractious Moro ethnic grouping known for intra-tribal rivalry and, at its worse, discord.
In fact, Moro political leaders should have, if they had the hindsight, already built the foundation for her legacy while she was alive. It’s the tragedy of the world that people, leaders, their achievements and feats are only given recognition posthumously. That should change.
SDN dares everyone to live up to her ideals, her integrity, her virtues of honor, integrity, compassion, kindness, courage, unselfishness, humility, etc.
Perhaps, not in a thousand years would there be a Moro woman molded in the character that enveloped her persona; she may not be with us in her physical being, but surely her memory will last for all time.
I can’t remember whether I had the honor of meeting her in person and shaking her regal hand; maybe I did, I surely hope I did.
For I have been to her beloved Marawi City, Lanao del Sur l, a few times. Of the People of the Lake, I count many of them as my friends and brothers, and I still do.
When I was younger, in my teens, I heard the name “Princess Tarhata” and had the fascination about it.
Mere mention of “Princess Tarhata” evoked awe and respect!
That’s how The Princess should be remembered. (✓)
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Featured image of a young Bai Tata, the Princess Tarhata Alonto Lucman, the first woman governor of Lanao del Sur in 1971, of credit and thanks to bangsaranao.blogspot.com.