BULUAN, Maguindanao – Justice-seeking Esmael “Toto” Mangudadatu formally took over the reign of leadership in Maguindanao on Wednesday with a vow for “surgical-like” reforms in the provincial governance that has long been beset by feudal politics.

“We are not your masters but your servants,” Mangudadatu told hundreds of people and local officials during his 29-minute inaugural address, one minute of which he asked the crowd to spend for quite prayers for his wife, Genalyn, two sisters and 55 others who were massacred in Ampatuan, Maguindanao on November 23, 2009.

The slain kin were on a convoy Mangudadatu sent to file his certificate of candidacy for governor at the Commission on Elections (Comelec) office in Shariff Aguak town that fateful day. At least 31 journalists and two lady lawyers accompanying the Mangudadatus were also killed in the massacre.

“Only non-violence can achieve a moral purpose without compromising it, especially if the purpose is peace. It cuts through its objectives with the precision of a surgical knife, neatly excising the cancer form our body politic without damage to surrounding tissues. The healing comes faster,” the 41-year old governor said in his speech.

Mangudadatu opted for the turnover rites between him and outgoing OIC-Gov. Gani Biruar at the Buluan town hall compound, instead of the provincial capitol site in Shariff Aguak town, the home of the rival Ampatuan clan.

The security arrangements in the turnover rites were so tight that Mangudadatu rode an Army Simba tank tailed by a convoy of military escorts from his residence to the venue on Wednesday morning.

Mangudadatu told reporters he opted for the unusual mode of transport on advice of military officers, who reportedly intercepted a sinister plan to bomb his convoy along the way.