by Nikki Rivera Gomez/Special to MindaNews
DAVAO CITY (MindaNews/26 July) -- When the Bishops Ulama Conference (BUC) first seized the opportunity last year to commence an island-wide consultation on peace, it barely realized the length and breadth of the effort. To begin with, crafting a no-nonsense research agenda and getting it off the ground required patience and fortitude, to say nothing of sheer skill. Second, the conditions then were too volatile for a peace-related campaign to soar, much less take off. A breakdown in the talks between government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) led to a bloody spiral of events: Fighting broke out in Lanao del Norte, North Cotabato, Basilan, and Sarangani, and bombs went off in Iligan City. Twenty seven people died in those attacks and close to 30,000 fled for their lives.
Still, the BUC plodded on, enlisting the expertise and commitment of Albert Alejo, SJ, an anthropologist based at the Ateneo de Davao University.
From the beginning, Alejo knew that the conditions then, as they had persisted throughout the years, required an effort to build on previous attempts to determine the people’s pulse on peace and development in Mindanao. This could be achieved by conducting some 300 focus group discussions (FGD) across the island. The idea was to put together a scientific research design, farm out the data-gathering across Muslims, Christians, and Lumad communities, and further sift the data by sectoral classification, e.g. urban poor, fisherfolk, entrepreneurs, etc.
Ambitious but doable
The task was admittedly ambitious, yet paradoxically doable. Alejo and Davao archbishop Fernando Capalla, BUC chair, agreed to engage the services of Mindanao-based schools and universities, if for nothing else for their collective record of academic excellence and independence. Since then, the project has leapt forward.
Today, three months after the BUC formally launched Konsult Mindanaw, the consultation project’s implementing arm, activities are on the homestretch.
“We’re almost done with 300 FGDs covering diverse sectors and regions of Mindanao and reaching even Muslims in Cebu, Manila, Baguio, and Southern Palawan. By end of August we should have regional results, and by December the consolidated Mindanao report,” says Alejo.
Polling community sentiments has yielded insights otherwise left unreported by the mainstream media.
In many consultations, reports Alejo, “you can feel the people’s deep hunger for sincerity from both government and the MILF, but most especially from the government.”
He shared glimpses of how ordinary folk regard peace and the pursuit of it. Respondents, he said, offered a litany of suggestions: “Other sectors must also work for peace. Schools must correct presentation of history and remove biases. Media should highlight peace efforts, not just the conflicts and bombings. Indigenous peoples must also be heard. Businesses should invest in conflict areas. People should try to learn the language of another tribe. The bakwits (evacuees from conflict-affected areas) must be given assistance. People must go deep into their own religious traditions.”
Limitations
Although the momentum of the consultations is on the right track, the exercise is not without some limitations. Alejo points out that the FGDs may be inclusive and extensive, but these “cannot be expected to offer concrete recommendations on technical issues like constitutionality.”
Also, some other groups may not be covered by the dialogues, which is why KM will “share notes” with other entities like the Mindanao People’s Caucus, the Mindanao Business Council, Initiatives for International Dialogue, Afrim, and the Mindanao Economic Development Council.
In other words, Alejo says, the project isn’t perfect.
Yet, imperfect and organic as it is, KM has weathered the proverbial pangs of birthing. Prof. Minalang Barapantao, KM area coordinator for Lanao, braved local voices and actions hostile to the interfaith dialogues. Angry sentiments were exchanged through two-way radios and anti-consultation streamers were hoisted in city streets.
But in an interview, he said that “despite the threat which was imminent, we in the Lanao area management team continued to do the job assigned to us by the bishop (Elenito Galido). We participated in this project with the commitment that we will do our best because we believe that this will be for the good of the Moro people. Therefore, we will not allow a threat, no matter how serious it is, to derail our efforts to finish the project we were tasked to do.”
Barapantao, who teaches at the Mindanao State University in Marawi City, says he remains optimistic about the peace process with the MILF. But it is a peace “that has to be sustained. In other words, the initial successes that we may achieve have to be sustained as far as we are concerned.”
Not just a study
This commitment is shared by Atty. Udtog Tago, a member of the KM management team. Going beyond the trite definitions of project management, Tago said that “KM is not just a study towards peace that will determine the views, opinions, aspirations and recommendations about peace and the maintenance of it. It is by itself a peace process, a peace initiative, a peace building, a peace in the making and a peace foundation.”
Tago observed that during a pre-testing activity at Mountain View Collage in Valencia City, the students observed that the consultation could “help eradicate prejudices and biases. In Marawi City, farmers expressed their longing to live even for some moment in peace, expressing satisfaction that they are part of a consultation whereby they can relay their feelings and aspirations. To them, it was the first of its kind and a great opportunity for people in their category to be heard.”
Indeed, being “listened to” may reverberate in many parts of rural Mindanao, where poverty and social inequity reign.
Alma Eleazar, area coordinator for Caraga, pondered the initial results of her team’s survey and said that KM “is important also to the Christians as they live out their faith, in the sense that their faith is telling them that there (should be) justice. How is that justice seen and how is that justice manifested as we work towards peace—when there are, for example, instances of illegal logging and mining and corruption in government which prevents development for the people?”
Eleazar, a senior official at Urios University in Butuan City, apparently knows what she’s talking about, Caraga being one of the ten poorest provinces in the Philippines. In the end, she waxes optimistic: “Personally I am really hopeful that things will work out well and (the community consultations) will bear fruit if people start talking and start reflecting and seeing what they can do to have peace. “ (Nikki Rivera Gomez is communications coordinator of Konsult Mindanaw).
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