Sarayan High School (Barangay Sarayan)

 school, high school

Before the migration of early Christian settlers, Sarayan was inhabited already by the natives in scattered places, usually living in the river banks and creeks, composed of one or two families. Hunting is their source of livelihood.
According to the story of Datu Caid Lansawan, when he came to this place sometime in the early 50’s he was mesmerized to see a very beautiful place which he describe to be “a plane decorated with mountain ranges” or in Manobo the term is “Rayan Dayan” where the word Sarayan was taken. Datu Lansawan has a very great vision that someday the place will become a municipality so he requested the Bureau of Lands to reserve 100 hectares for the town site. Because of this move he became famous as the “Father of Arakan Valley”.
According to him Sarayan has already an Elementary school in 1954. He was the Head Teacher with a couple teachers Mr. and Mrs. Doduaco. Their pupils were mostly full grown natives (Manobo) and few Christians and Muslim settlers.
Sarayan become a regular barangay in 1957 under the municipality of Kabacan. Sarayan and the neighboring barangay was release as an agricultural settlement in 1957 through Presidential Proclamation by the late President Carlos P. Garcia. It has been approved as Town site known as T.S. 304 and was surveyed in 1959 by the Bureau of Lands, Kidapawan Branch with the mother mark PLS-579. Upon the creation of the Municipality of Matalam, Cotabato in 1962, Sarayan was separated from Kabacan. Barangay Sarayan is celebrating its Annual Founding Anniversary every 27th of November.
The heavy flows of Christian settlers mostly Ilongos with some Ilocanos, Cebuanos and other tribes was in 1958 to 1960. The first elected Barangay Captain in 1961 was Brgy. Cpt, Jose Robles an Ilonggo. In 1960 Datu Caid Lansawan was given the opportunity to become the District Municipality Mayor of Sarayan by the late Governor Datu Udtug Matalam, where at that time the governor has the power to create a municipality. Datu Lansawan declines the offer and so Sarayan did not become a town.
At present Barangay Sarayan was divided into two after the creation of President Roxas Municipality. The boundary between the two municipalities is the Arakan River which passes at the center of the proposed Town Site T.S. – 304, thus dividing Sarayan into two. The northern part is Sarayan, Pres. Roxas while the southern part is Sarayan, Matalam.
Sarayan had experienced destructive moments. The place was harassed and was burn to ashes not once but four times. In 1970 during the height of the Muslim and Christian conflicts all structures such as school buildings, market buildings, residential houses were put on fire while live stock such as cattle, chickens and others were taken by the rebels. The place was declared as a “No Man’s Land”. After few years the people tried to re-establish their livelihood in the place but in 1972 and 1974 the same harassment happened. It was repeated for the fourth time in 1976.
Finally since early 1980’s up to this time, the place was no longer disturbed by the rebels. The creation of Civilian Home Defense Force (CHDF) had helped so much in controlling the peace and order of the community.