The Malunggay Conflict

The Malunggay Conflict is an adventure story arc of the Philippine comic strip series Pugad Baboy, created by Pol Medina Jr. and originally published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer. This particular story arc lasts 30 strips long. In 1992, the story arc was reprinted in Pugad Baboy 4, the fourth book compilation of the comic strip series.

The story arc has many parallelisms to the First Gulf War.

Synopsis

Ka Noli takes the Pugad Baboy gang to his native Ilocos Region, specifically to Gabu and Bangui,Ilocos Norte. There they meet Ka Kwate (his name is a spoof of Kuwait and may also be a play on kakawate, the Filipino word for madre de cacao), a farmer with a green thumb and a friend of Ka Noli. The gang samples the rural lifestyle of the residents of Bangui, planting vegetables and trying Basi (wine made from sugar cane) and ginataang palaka (frog legs cooked in coconut milk).

One day Ka Kwate discovers that a malunggay tree he owns has been annexed into his neighbor Ka Damuseyn's (a spoof of Saddam Hussein) territory. Ka Kwate complains to the UN (United Neighbors of Bangui) and the council approves the use of force against Ka Damuseyn. Ka Noli enlists the help of his Tiyuhing Samuel (Uncle Sam, modeled on George H. W. Bush), famed witch doctor of Bangui, and his assistant, Swarskop (a spoof of H. Norman Schwarzkopf). Samuel uses a "mystical jar" to summon winged insects that eat plants to devastate Ka Damuseyn's vegetable garden; an airstrike of sorts. Ka Damuseyn retaliates by using his own "mystical jar", which he calls the "Mother of all Bottles"; summoning insects to attack Ka Kwate's own garden. Samuel, however, calls upon ducks and geese to intercept Ka Damuseyn's insect forces, and deploys snails in a land assault. The damage to his gardens is more that Ka Damuseyn could take; he surrenders and the malunggay tree was returned to the ownership of Ka Kwate.

Parallelisms with the First Gulf War

Several objects and events in relation the First Gulf War were used by the cartoonist as "material" for this story arc. Aside from the obvious (such as Ka Kwate, Ka Damuseyn, and Tiyuhing Samuel), here are the other parallelisms between the Malunggay Conflict and the First Gulf War:

Miscellaneous trivia