ABORIGINAL tribe the Aetas, which thinks Mount Pinatubo is its god, has come to Manila looking for free Christmas handouts because members believe the mountain is too angry to let them return to their ancestral homeland.
The Office for Northern Cultural Communities said about 500 Aetas, some still dressed in tribal hunting regalia and carrying bows and arrows, had come to Manila for the fourth year in succession because they thought the god of Mount Pinatubo had showed his displeasure towards them during the volcanic eruption of 1991.
However, the Government is trying to invoke anti-vagrancy laws to get the tribe sent back to the slopes of Mount Pinatubo, which have been turned barren by repeated volcanic ash flows during the 1995 rainy season.
The 500 nomadic Aetas have set up primitive shanty towns close to some of the major traffic intersections in Manila.
They either sell tribal souvenirs, beg for food with signs saying 'A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year' hung around their necks, or look for pamasko (Christmas gifts) from passing motorists.
Many of the Aetas make fires for cooking by chopping down trees or other wooden material they find in the streets.