There seems a tendency these days to see the hand of Islamist terrorists in any criminal operations mounted by armed bands. Where before we saw only plain outlaws and rebels of purely domestic interests roaming around, we now see not just any terrorists but terrorists of the most dreaded species — the Middle Eastern-bred ISIS (Islamic State).

Marawi City is a case in point running for weeks now. Troops there have been battling Abu Sayyaf brigands and renegades from rebel movements who now profess to fight together for ISIS, although not necessarily as conscripts. They do carry the ISIS flag to battle, but the suspicion is that they do so only to attract ISIS attention and financial support.

Replicas of the flag are shown on television left lying around in Marawi, offering themselves to the media for a dramatic illustration of news reporting. Once the pictures go out in print, on the air, and online their promotional value begins to be realized, and it accrues not only to an enemy looking for ISIS patronage. 

The government itself should feel favored by any impression that the conflict is more serious than it actually is; that it is serious enough to justify martial law, which President Duterte already has declared not just for Marawi or the province in which it is situated but for all of the island group of Mindanao; even serious enough to justify Duterte's warning that, given ISIS's aggressiveness, the emergency could spread across the country and eventually require nationwide martial rule.

A sort of ISIS hang-up indeed appears to have developed among us. When one man broke into the Resort World casino in Manila last week and shot up ceilings and walls and set fire to gambling tables, reflex reaction had some of us – media people included – searching for ISIS principals behind him. In a tone of excited eagerness, reporters were quick to ask the police chief, Gen. Ronald de la Rosa: So, is martial law coming down nationwide? 

In the end, no connection could be traced to ISIS, although credit for the attack was claimed in its name. But trust Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II to form in his imagination an even more ludicrous theory: If not ISIS, it must be Senator Leila de Lima; she may not have inspired the attack, but she could be accountable for the collateral cost of 37 people dying by asphyxiation in the casino fire.   

Aguirre refers to a legal opinion De Lima, as justice secretary herself, supposedly gave preventing the Bureau of Fire Protection from enforcing certain safety laws in casinos. Obviously, he is not through with De Lima, who has been in jail for 3 months now on another ridiculous concoction by him – that she is a drug lord.

Investigators have put together a likelier case: a gambling addict driven to debt, then to insanity, and finally to suicide, by self-immolation; in the panic and confusion, rescue efforts in the fire fell short. But apparently Aguirre is one lawyer who seems to me not impressed by theories too logical; to whom too logical is too pat. 

ISIS, Duterte scare

Aguirre just can’t seem to stop himself concocting. In fact, he had his own theory about Marawi. He said oppositionist lawmakers had gone there two weeks before and spoken with suspect families, and might thus have incited the enemy intrusion. 

Replying to the accusation, one of the accused lawmakers, Senator Antonio Trillanes IV, said, “The incompetence of Aguirre is only matched by his stupidity.”   

That may not be something legally provable, but, in his accusation of Trillanes and the others, Aguirre has been proved wrong on everything he passed off as fact — for one thing, the time was off by as much as two years and the place off by many miles.

In fact, about Marawi, fact is precisely what there’s too little of, and fear, on the other hand, is what there’s too much of. But then that may just be the precise idea; it certainly fits in with a plot, if there’s one, to promote an ISIS scare as well as with the president’s suggestion that he may go nationwide with his martial law. 

What’s certain is there’s a scare going around, if not an ISIS scare, a Duterte scare, and the latter seems to me the more plausible and imminently realizable.  – Rappler.com

The video clip of alleged Maute gang members smashing statues, tearing pictures of the saints and of the Pope and finally setting a Catholic Church ablaze have gone viral. And many are outraged. Many are incensed.  

But the gangsters committed the outrage precisely to goad us into an angry response – for which they are apparently very well prepared. Meaningful action calls on the resources of that brand of reflexivity characteristic of modernity. Things just do not happen. We seize on them; study them and then direct our actions accordingly. What may come about as a matter of chance becomes the template for plan and design.

The frightful violence that shows itself in the way harmless statues are flung down, trampled upon and smashed and in the torching of a place of worship is the conjugal partner of the intolerance that breeds fundamentalist militancy.  

Fundamentalists are convinced that modernity has had a corrupting influence on "the truth". And so they will be enemies of modernity and intolerant of any of its manifestations. There will be no accommodation of other views – whether these be political ideologies, philosophical worldviews or religions – because it is precisely pluralism that is, to them, the unforgivable culprit.

For one thing, the pluralism with which the 21st century seems to have reconciled itself threatens "ontological security" – a big term to suggest the security in one's being when traditions are in place, when repetition makes everything familiar, when places, positions and roles are not mixed up so that the established order remains unperturbed. 

Militant fundamentalists want this security that they feel has been snatched from them and denied them by the champions and the prophets of pluralism.  They are militant – destructively and murderously so, many times, because they have given up on the world listening to them, except when they do something dramatic like decapitate hostages, burn hospitals and rouse a sleepy town like Marawi and putting the whole nation on edge!

Quest for stability

Fundamentalism seeks foundations – and for Muslim and Christian fundamentalists alike, this will mean the basic texts of the Scriptures – the Bible and the Qur'an.  And since it is precisely the "interpretations" of modernity that have spoilt the pristine purity of these foundational – Divine – texts, then fundamentalists reject all interpretation, no matter how impossible a hermeneutic venture that might be!

But what the fundamentalist seeks is something we must all heed, because it is something common to our quest: stability.  

When, one day, marriage is the union of man and woman, and the next, it can become as permanent a union of two men or of two women, where men were assured that some roles were theirs in society and women's roles were different, and they wake up to a world where it really makes no difference whether it is a man or a woman who pilots the plain or commands an entire division or regiment, the experience of the rug pulled from beneath one's feet becomes terribly unnerving.

This is by no means an apologia for Maute. They committed crimes and their professed "allegiance" to one of the most destructive and remorseless organizations the world has ever known – ISIS  (or DAESH) does not make things any better for them.  

But it should help to understand with more reflection why phenomena like these have become disturbingly commonplace in many parts of the world and now, God forbid, in the Philippines. – Rappler.com

The author is vice president of the Cagayan State University and Dean, Graduate School of Law, San Beda College.

(READ: Part 1: Filipino Islam will outlast its fanatics)

In my years doing field research in Moro Mindanao, I was not only in awe of Moro entrepreneurship, I was also captivated by the power of Moro women.

The Moro-Filipina is the antipode of the Muslim woman that ISIS and those other fundamentalists groups like the King of Saudi Arabia and Iranian mullahs “idealize” – subordinated and deferential to their men, demure, quiet, covered, and at times, a non-entity. Moro-Filipinas are often independent of their men, assertive, vocal, see the hijab as just another way of projecting their identity, and definitely, are major players in the locality.

Consider their relationships with their husbands. The Muslim women I talked to and had become friends with unanimously agree that the discreet faces of women one sees in public meetings between Moro and official of the central state, hide a power that includes dictating to their husbands where the conversation should go (or not go), when it can continue, and when it stops.

I witnessed this silent power while I was still working in Japan. An influential and well-respected Moro leader was giving his insights on the Bangsamoro struggle, including disagreeing with my evaluations. After over two hours of animated jeremiad, he suddenly stopped. I turned to my left and saw his wife slashing her throat and saying, in Bisayan, “Husto na, gutom na ko. Uli na ta.” The lecture was over, and he and his wife trooped out in search of food.

Watching this made me remember this description of Sultan Jamalul Kiram’s daughter Tarhata by the American writer Florence Horn while she was visiting Jolo. She wrote:

“Moreover, where some see unremitting resistance in the revolts against colonial rule, new motivations were at work. A good illustration is the 1927 revolt of Datu Tahil Lidasan, who had become famous for leading the Battle of Bud Bagsak in 1913 but who later served as a member of the Sulu Provincial Board. In 1927, Lidasan announced his opposition to the head tax and the ban on carrying weapons in public and withdrew with 100 followers to a cotta (fort) to await government attack. At first glance, a repeat of Bud Bagsak, but a closer look reveals a different picture: Lidasan took up arms at the instigation of his wife, the American-educated Princess Tarhata, niece of the Sultan of Sulu after she failed to get him appointed as Governor of Jolo. The Constabulary defeated Lidasan (leaving 35 dead) and sentenced him to 7 years imprisonment. Tarhata divorced her now politically useless husband, married a Cebuano and entered local politics. (Horn, Orphans of the Pacific: The Philippines, 1941: 155).

Tarhata went on to become one of the most well-respected Moro women of her time.

Of course, she learned her spurs from her mother Princess Piando, who was herself an influential figure in colonial Sulu society. The incoming American District Officer of Jolo, Lt Colonel Sydney Cloman was impressed at how Princess Piando manipulated her husband, Sultan Jamalul Kiram, by forcing him to wear a termite-ravaged tuxedo he used to wear while trading in British Singapore. After that Cloman knew whose opinions he needed to know first.

Moro women are the mediators who resolve rido, the notorious clan wars that are the primary cause of conflict in Moro Mindanao. According to Wilfrido Torres and Steven Rood, in the revised and expanded edition of their book, Rido: Clean Feuding and Conflict Management in Mindanao, the “rido code of honor” disallows attacks on women. This was why when the Ampatuans killed the wife of Ismael Mangundadatu along with 56 other people on November 23, 2008, the war between the two most powerful families of Maguindanao Province will continue until the Ampatuands sacrifice members of their family whose standing equaled those of Mrs Mangundadatu.

It was also the sway of Moro women in their communities that made the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) reach out to them to offer them the role of monitors of its economic programs in the war zones. USAID’s Livelihood Economic Assistance Program (LEAP), a project aimed at helping former MNLF rebels get back on their feet, would not have succeeded had USAID’s Moro women partners not kept close tabs on their progress.

Finally, there are the Moro feminists like Rufa Cagoco Guiam (of Mindanao State University-General Santos) and Bagian Aleyasa Abdulkarim (Dean of the College of Social Work and Community Development at Western Mindanao State University) who are the leading academics as well as civil society leaders.

Rufa has been a friend of long duration and I make sure that I visit her when I am in Mindanao. I saw her pluckiness in action a month before the Maguindanao massacre when our taxi was stopped at the entrance of Shariff Aguak, Maguindanao, the residence of the brutal Ampatuan family.

About 15 armed men surrounded our Kia taxi and demanded P4,000 as “part of the celebration of Ramadan.” The 3 of us – the driver, Rufa’s former capataz, and myself – were petrified by these armed men (their affiliations were mixed: some wore army uniforms, others claimed they were police, and one even leaned on the window and whispered to me that he was MNLF).

Rufa was not. She calmly explained to these thugs that as a teacher at MSU-General Santos and their fellow Muslim she knew that Ramadan was a month of generosity and righteousness. If we give them the P4,000, she argued, it was not an act of kindness, but a painful response to a threat (she pointed to their guns).

And this was not a righteous act, nor would it be considered real gift-giving. In the end, we reached a compromise – P2,000 for “wasting their time” checking. No one violated Ramadan. We left just in the nick of time. Our taxi driver was just about to text his policeman-brother in the nearby town and ask him to rescue us. As we sped away from the checkpoint, back to General Santos, Rufa sighed and said, “Ah the price of peace.” I did not know what she meant then. I know now.

The Maute gang, these “monumental assholes” (to borrow a phrase the comic John Oliver used to describe the London attackers) have no idea what awaits them should they try to impose their backward ISIS-inspired values on these Moro women. For if they do, their comeuppance will be quick and, yes, nasty. – Rappler.com

Patricio N. Abinales remains in awe of these Moro women.

(First of two parts) 

The Duterte administration's public launch of its Philippine Development Plan (PDP) 2017-2022 on June 2 somewhat coincidentally happened the day after the supposed June 1 end of the 5th round of the peace talks between the Philippine government and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP). The cancellation of talks by the government is unfortunate because discussions on a comprehensive agreement on social and economic reforms (CASER) were meant to take up most of this round. This would have been an opportunity for new thinking on the part of the government to replace the failed neoliberalism of old.  

The Duterte administration came to power almost a year ago on the promise of change. This presumably included changing the economic policies that keep tens of millions in poverty and transforming the economy into a developed and sustainable one. The Philippine Development Plan (PDP) 2017-2022 unfortunately recycles failed "free market" globalization policies of past administrations. The only "change" is to further increase profits and wealth for a few at the expense of real development for the many – which is no change at all.

The PDP 2017-2022 acknowledges many of the features of the country's economic backwardness such as weak agriculture, inadequate industrial development, job scarcity, continued poverty and low incomes, and stagnating social indicators. It also surpasses previous plans in the attention it gives to international trends including the protracted global economic crisis, populist and protectionist tendencies, inequality, and climate change.

However, it has a simplistic and outdated explanation of the problem with the economy. According to the plan, the main problem is that the government restrains development by being unfriendly to business. The ideological justification for this is the quasi-religious faith that capitalist profit-seeking amid as free and unregulated markets as possible will solve social and economic problems. This notion also gets self-serving support from foreign investors and domestic oligarchs who want the state to put their narrow interests above those of the nation and long-term development. 

The plan will fail to transform the Philippines into the "prosperous middle-class society where no one is poor" declared by the government. This is because the plan will keep the country's agriculture and industry backward and mere adjuncts of foreign capital. Unemployment will remain high, incomes low, and Filipinos forced overseas for work.  Growth spurts driven by debt and speculation will only become fewer and farther between. Any increase in per capita income will be mostly because of growing concentration of wealth in a few rather than higher incomes for the majority.

Lucid

The PDP 2017-2022 says that it is anchored on the AmBisyon Natin 2040 long-term economic vision for the country and is also guided by the 0+10-point Socioeconomic Agenda of the Duterte administration. The plan begins by taking a long view of the country's trajectory against a reading of global and regional trends and prospects. 

The plan lucidly presents its approach over 435 pages. It talks about "enhancing the social fabric" by improving governance, the administration of justice, and promoting Philippine culture and values. The inclusion of a distinct chapter on culture is innovative but at the same time because there is nowhere any mention of nationalism, alarming.

The next three sections are the sum of its economic policies. The plan is conscious of public frustration with long-standing poverty and worsening inequity and talks about "inequality-reducing transformation."

This section elaborates on expanding economic opportunities in agriculture, forestry, fisheries, industry, and services, and on human capital development, on reducing vulnerability, and on building safe and secure communities. It talks about "increasing growth potential" through exploiting a so-called demographic dividend and advancing science, technology, and innovation. And it asserts its free market orientation under the rhetoric of "enabling and supportive economic environment," spanning macroeconomic policy and national competition policy.

The next section highlights the Duterte administration's supposed points of emphasis. The "foundations for sustainable development" talk about attaining a just and lasting peace, ensuring public order and safety, ensuring ecological integrity, and accelerating infrastructure development. The plan is particularly obsessed about insufficient infrastructure being a binding constraint. The final section is just about plan implementation and monitoring.

Wrong

While lucid, the plan is still wrong and will keep the Philippines backward. Three major flaws immediately come to mind, all of which stem from the plan's obsolete market fundamentalism.

First, the plan avoids correcting the severe asset inequities and income imbalances that keep millions of Filipinos marginalized from meaningful economic activity. This means that all the plan's rhetoric about creating economic opportunities will really just mean greater profitable opportunities for the few who have the accumulated assets and incomes to begin with. Free market economics exalts asset accumulation as proof of efficiency and income inequality as incentivizing efficiency.

The plan goes on at length about increasing agricultural productivity. It correctly identifies the need to improve farm technologies spanning research and development, technology adoption, mechanization and post-harvest facilities. It also rightly points out expensive and inadequate irrigation, limited access to credit and insurance, and weak linkages to the industrial and service sectors. The measures to improve these are potentially welcome. 

The problem, however, is that these measures will create opportunities mainly for farmers, but especially rich farmers, who already own and control the most important rural asset: land. Millions of landless peasants and farm workers on the other hand will gain peripherally, at best, or in many cases likely not at all. 

The plan is unfortunately oblivious to how decades of land reform, including under the most recent Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) since 1987 and its later extension, have failed to genuinely distribute land to millions of farmers nor given them the means to make this productive. Persistent landlessness and monopolies on land are the greatest barriers to improving agricultural productivity.

The plan mentions agrarian reform but remains fixated on its mere administrative implementation or the paper distribution of remaining reported backlogs. A better starting point would be to explain why land ostensibly distributed has ended up re-concentrated in the hands of landlords, agribusiness corporations, and real estate developers. Merely continuing pseudo-distribution of land will not resolve rural poverty.

Having said that, the change in policy towards free land distribution to landless farmers and agricultural workers is still a significant policy shift. This is an important achievement from decades of militant struggle by the Philippine peasant movement and successfully clinched by the incursion of peasant leader Ka Paeng Mariano into government to helm the agrarian reform department. It is at least one part of correcting severe imbalances in rural power (with the other part increasing the confiscatory aspect of land transfers).

The plan is as unfriendly to workers as it is to peasants. It seeks to strengthen implementation of the two-tiered wage system whose tendency is to push down the basic floor wage while making an increasing part of it, the so-called productivity tier, merely voluntary for employers.

The net result will be to further repress worker pay whose real level, or taking inflation into account, has already fallen to lower than it was fifteen years ago. Yet raising wages is among the most important instruments for making growth inclusive and benefiting millions of workers.

The plan also pushes to worsen inequity in the country by pushing for the Department of Finance's (DOF) grossly regressive tax reform program. The DOF's tax plan seeks to reduce income and wealth taxes paid by rich families and large corporations and off-sets this with higher consumption taxes on the country's majority including the poorest Filipinos.

This is camouflaged as "broadening the tax base" (i.e., taxing more Filipinos) and "making taxes internationally competitive" (i.e. reducing taxes paid by the rich) amid hype about greater simplicity and efficiency. Yet a progressive tax system that taxes the rich more and the poor less is a critical measure for reducing inequity in the country, aside from raising resources for government social and economic services.

Sonny Africa is the executive director of ​IBON Foundation, Inc, an independent development institution established in 1978 that provides research, education, publications, information work and advocacy support on socioeconomic issues. He wrote this as part of a series of Ibon features. 

(Second of two parts) 

READ FIRST PART: Duterte's development plan: Recycled, failed economic policies

The Duterte administration's public launch of its Philippine Development Plan (PDP) 2017-2022  on June 2 somewhat coincidentally happened the day after the supposed June 1 end of the 5th round of the peace talks between the Philippine government and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP). The cancellation of talks by the government is unfortunate because discussions on a comprehensive agreement on social and economic reforms (CASER) were meant to take up most of this round. This would have been an opportunity for new thinking on the part of the government to replace the failed neoliberalism of old.

While lucid, the plan is still wrong and will keep the Philippines backward. Three major flaws immediately come to mind, all of which stem from the plan's obsolete market fundamentalism. 

First, the plan avoids correcting the severe asset inequities and income imbalances that keep millions of Filipinos marginalized from meaningful economic activity. 

This means that all the plan's rhetoric about creating economic opportunities will really just mean greater profitable opportunities for the few who have the accumulated assets and incomes to begin with. Free market economics exalts asset accumulation as proof of efficiency and income inequality as incentivizing efficiency.

Second, the plan is blind to the urgency of industrial development. The Philippine economy has to be rebalanced away from its bloated service sector towards real domestic industry.

The plan succumbs to the outdated globalization propaganda that the only industry worth developing is what the world market decides is globally 'competitive'. The industrialized countries promote this notion to preserve their privileged industrial status and the economic and political power that comes with this. The plan also crudely believes that liberalized market forces deepen and modernize the economy, produce high growth, and reduce joblessness and poverty.

Shallow aspiration

The plan does not recognize the importance of industrialization. For instance, it illogically lumps together "industry and services" with the shallow aspiration for these to be "globally competitive as the country strengthens its economic ties with other countries.” This is perplexing.

Industrial activity and services are vastly different in nature and have vastly different contributions to development. Industrialization creates more employment, raises incomes higher, stimulates greater economic activity, and drives better science and technology. This is why industry has primacy when pursuing strategic economic development.

The lumping together is all the more baffling considering how 'services' cover a wide range of disparate activities from food to finance, health to hotels, call centers to communication, and many others. 

The plan also adopts the textbook approach of trade based on comparative advantage as determining the choice of industries and services and driving development. The real world approach should instead be to adopt policies that modify and create comparative advantages that deliver more far-reaching changes and are more strategic over the long-term.

In terms of industry, this means steadily working towards having Filipino firms using the country's vast natural and human resources to produce capital, intermediate, and consumer goods on a large-scale.

This means national industrialization that aligns policies on foreign trade and investment, on finance, monetary and fiscal matters, on education, science and technology, and on the environment to serve strategic industrial goals.

Industrial policy has to focus on building domestic industrial capacity to meet domestic needs, create domestic jobs, and raise domestic incomes. Such a focus will also involve linking up with the agricultural and service sectors.

The plan's proposals work against this and surrender the necessary state policy instruments to industrialize the economy. It seeks to remove restrictions to foreign investment which are crucial for ensuring that foreign capital contributes to domestic developmemin,nt. It seeks to remove regulatory requirements and procedures which are crucial in ensuring that firms operate in ways consistent with broader development goals.

These and other policy tools were essential elements in the rise of all the old industrial powers as well as in the emergence of all the recent high-performing developing countries.

The plan's agnostic market-driven approach will relegate the Philippines and Filipino producers to low value-added activities, and in effect letting foreign producers get the most advantage from the country's natural resources and labor power. There is no historical precedent of free market forces transforming any national economy to higher value-added and more diversified activities.

It is natural to be skeptical of the government's capacity for responsible industrial intervention. The country has a long history of regulatory capture, rent-seeking, crony capitalism, and the like, resulting in wasted public resources and economic backwardness.

The appropriate response however is not to glorify market forces but to improve governance. The capacity to intervene is developed by intervening; and the quality of intervention can only improve in step with improvements in government transparency and accountability.

Third, the plan turns over vital social services and public utilities to profit-seeking private sector interests which will make these unaffordable and inaccessible for the majority of Filipinos. The plan continues government neglect of its responsibility to ensure that all Filipinos have the basic services so necessary for minimum standards of decent living. It does not correct the growing privatization of education, health, housing, water, electricity and transport which are more and more becoming commodities to profit from than vital services to live by.

Universal provision of these has to be ensured. However, instead of developing public capacity in providing these, the plan calls for encouraging greater private sector participation through greater incentives and streamlined processes especially in infrastructure. This will result in more public resources supporting private profits, aside from adding a profit premium to basic services.

Forward

Undertaking social and economic reforms is certainly an arduous task. This starts with discarding market fundamentalism that glorifies profit-seeking and self-interest as resulting in economic efficiency and development.

Market fundamentalism is a notion that has been justifiably criticized across ideological boundaries since the 19th century and until today – from Karl Marx to Joseph Stiglitz, from Mao Zedong to George Soros, and from rightist populist politicians to the revolutionary Left.

The Philippines' experience with failed neoliberal policies is clear and consistent with similar failures in the rest of the world. Real changes in policies are needed to bring about real development.

The PDP 2017-2022 is too consistent with its predecessors and will just be the latest in a long line of failed development plans. It simplistically assumes that making it easier to do business, attracting more foreign investment, and building more infrastructure will result in a bright future.

On the contrary, the plan's market fundamentalism will keep the economy backward and Filipinos poor. Industrial production will continue to be foreign-dominated, agriculture and mining industry willcater to foreign economies, and unemployment and poverty will remain endemic.

All this while a few foreign investors, domestic conglomerates, and rich families continue to grow rich and prosper.  – Rappler.com

Sonny Africa is the executive director of ​IBON Foundation, Inc, an independent development institution established in 1978 that provides research, education, publications, information work and advocacy support on socioeconomic issues. He wrote this as part of a series of Ibon features.

The tragedy of Vitaliano Aguirre II’s recent lie is not so much his refusal to bow in shame for it, it is the sorry fact that we are his captive audience, desperate to be liberated from his alternative truths but stuck in a country that has him for justice secretary.

Aguirre’s fake news about a supposed opposition meeting to plot the Marawi attacks isn’t his first foray into trolling. He enjoys a hefty record of peddling speculation, insinuation, and false information, all earned in less than a year. At the height of the De Lima drug scandal last year, he announced on radio the (fake) ambush of a wife of an alleged drug lord. The Makati police said no such thing happened; Aguirre stuck to his guns. He also identified a has-been in politics who had no stake at all in the drug fracas, Jamby Madrigal, as one who bribed Bilibid inmates to retract their testimonies against De Lima. He dragged the South Korean embassy in Manila into the kidnapping and killing of one of their own, businessman Jee Ick Joo. 

Through outright lies, hidden lies, and unacknowledged lies, Aguirre gives law and government a bad name.

So what are the lawyers like him going to do about it?

What are the decent, truth-seeking members of the Duterte Cabinet going to do about it – considering that his department is the primary investigative and prosecutorial arm of a bureaucracy that will outlast presidents, politicians, and political appointees?

What are his “victims” – lawmakers, public officials, private citizens – going to do about it?

We ask them to take action. 

We ask them to seek concrete redress of the immediate and long-term consequences of institutionalized falsehood, as represented by him who gets paid by taxpayers and is mandated to heed the code of public conduct. 

We ask them to make him account for breaking the Filipino lawyer’s oath to “do no falsehood, nor consent to the doing of any in court,” and public officials’ commitment to the “highest degree of excellence, professionalism, intelligence and skill.”

The justice secretary diminishes our faith in the institutions and people tasked to serve this nation.

As we celebrate Independence Day, we ask to be free – free from his spin, lies, and conspiracies. – Rappler.com

A recent study showed that religious fundamentalists have damaged brains. Apparently, impairments in a part of the prefrontal cortex diminishes one’s capacity to be open minded, leading to the kind of blind devotion that creates monsters like ISIS terrorists. The research builds on previous findings on “cognitive flexibility,” which is the brain’s capacity to consider multiple ideas and possibilities. One’s cognitive flexibility can be impaired because of brain trauma – either through accidents or lifestyle – or one’s genetic profile.

The study discussed religious fundamentalism in particular, but the implications are far-reaching: Some people have a harder time changing their minds. This harrowing biological reality, however, should not prevent us from confronting the need to constantly convince others and to have ourselves convinced. Social media, as is now commonly argued, easily slots us in to self-referential silos, where we simply reinforce what we and our friends already believe and know. This phenomenon is very pronounced in the Philippines, since, as Rappler CEO and Executive Editor Maria Ressa explains, the advocates of authoritarianism have turned the internet into a weapon of deception. At no point in our country’s history have we needed more cognitive flexibility. 

It helps to remind ourselves that some remarkable people have made their mark on history by altering strongly held beliefs. Personally, I derive great enjoyment and deep edification from the stories of intellectuals whose search for truth led them to unlikely places. My favorite fictionist is Arthur Koestler, whose psychodrama Darkness at Noon, did more than Orwell’s 1984 (a remarkable novel in itself) to expose the totalitarianism of Bolshevism. What makes Koestler a more fascinating critic Communism than Orwell is the fact that he himself had been a Communist. As a former Party member, Koestler had a profound understanding of the psychology that allows angry people to rid others of their humanity for the sake of a “revolutionary” tomorrow.

In the Philippines, our most piercing critic of domestic Maoism/Stalinism is the former CPP leader and now political scientist Nathan Quimpo. Having seen both bloody barrios and the neutered netherworld of the Netherlands, Quimpo authoritatively tells us what the CPP-NPA would have done had their Philippine revolution succeeded in the 80s: “Thank goodness, we didn’t win in 1986. If we had, the Philippines would have ended up with a regime worse than Marcos’s – a totalitarian dictatorship.” Since ye ole Party suffers from a generalized cognitive inflexibility, what makes anyone think they’d be different if they won today?

Proud of 'hypocrisies'

If I brag about anything, it is about the times I’ve reversed political positions. In college, I was broadly anti-American and thought US presence in Mindanao was imperialist. These days, largely because of the influence of my mentor Patricio Abinales, I think Filipinos have had a deeper history of colonialism in Moro Mindanao than the Yanks, who are now more focused on aid work. During grad school I was part of a Trotskyite socialist party in Australia, which had a romantic attachment to Hugo Chavez. As passionately as I believed in Chavismo then, I can no longer deny that his brand of populism ruined Venezuela (warning, Digong). Most recently, I wrote about my shift from Aquino-basher to “yellowtard.” I am proud of my “hypocrisies.” 

Ironically, being comfortable with changing your mind allows you to take more categorical stances. Usually, people are wishy washy because they hedge their bets; they want to look back and be able to claim that they were partially correct. I do not feel the need to be partially correct when I can simply admit that my once categorical stance was categorically wrong. I was wrong when I claimed that my comrade Risa Hontiveros would not win her Senate bid last year, and I was happy to apologize for my strident, incorrect comments. If you’re used to changing your mind, you get used to accepting you’re wrong, and this makes it easier for you to eat crow. 

I have relished taking stances, being wrong, revising my positions – rinsing and repeating the process. It’s fun. Yet our society can make it difficult for people to evolve politically and ethically. Perhaps elements of Philippine religiosity have enforced stubbornness, with such shibboleths as: stick to your conscience, keep the faith, and, for those of a different theological orientation, combat revisionism.  

We dismiss the periodic mind-changer as a hypocrite or a traitor. And, indeed, some are, like our opportunist politicians who engage in the age-old tradition of turncoatism. But sometimes all it takes is imagination to view political evolution askance: Where some see hypocrisy, see open-mindedness; and where some see integrity, see the arrogance of obduracy. 

Fundamentalist zeal is everywhere today. Once upon a time, I thought “die hard supporters” were simply Nora Aunor or Ginebra fans. Nowadays, they are people who endorse the Great Leader regardless of circumstance. And in my lot of “yellowtards” there are a number of self-righteous, sanctimonious blowhards as well. 

But the majority of Filipinos do not have brain damage. Some of us might have some cognitive flexibility left, and, as the national drama of Dutertismo unfolds, the field may yet be set for some epic mind changing.– Rappler.com

Lisandro E. Claudio (@leloyclaudio on Twitter) is an Associate Professor at the Department of History, De La Salle University. 

Historian and professor Dr. Lisandro "Leloy" Claudio talks about Independence Day, and using the term 'Filipino' in this pilot episode of "Basagan Ng Trip."

Watch it here on Rappler. – Rappler.com

This week, on June 12, we celebrate Independence Day in the country. It's been 119 years since Emilio Aguinaldo declared our separation from Spain and we still debate about what makes us one country.

Down south, in the heartland of Mindanao, war is raging in the streets of the iconic city of Marawi, among others on the idea that what makes us different is greater than what unites us.

In this article, we look at another phenomenon that has divided this country from its foundational days, the concept of citizenship and who deserves that recognition. We look particularly at recent controversies to highlight the debate and point to ways forward in the interest of national unity.

The controversies around the citizenship status of former Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfecto Yasay Jr, Senator Alan Cayetano, and Senator Grace Poe emphasize again the reality that our country still needs to come to grips with how we accommodate global Filipinos into our society. The criticism against dual Filipinos like Loida Nicolas Lewis engaging in Philippine politics, is also an indication of this.

In particular, should global Filipinos be treated the same way as other citizens, or should they have less rights, particularly in political and governance matters? How restrictive should we be? Should Filipinos, who have some kind of foreign link by birth or through migration, be treated differently than other Filipinos? Or should we be liberal about this, including, for example, abandoning the natural-born citizenship requirement for many government positions, from as high as the President to ordinary workers in government?

When former senator Cayetano was appointed foreign affairs secretary a month ago, there was once again a small outcry about his citizenship. Thankfully, that died down quickly as it is a non-issue. Certainly, Secretary Cayetano's legal status cannot be compared to his predecessor's, Perfecto Yasay Jr. But the fact that some tried to make it an issue proves again that we have yet to come to terms with how we should accommodate global Filipinos into our society. 

Grace Poe and Loida Nicolas Lewis

We saw this question of the role of global Filipinos in the case of Grace Poe when, together with the issue of foundlings being natural born citizens, her reacquisition of Philippine citizenship and years of residence in the country were questioned. Thankfully, the Supreme Court decided these issues decisively in her favor, applying a liberal standard of interpretation to conclude that she has reacquired Philippine citizenship properly and had accumulated the required 10 years of residence to run for president. A contrary decision would have been disastrous for the Philippines.

Another global Filipino that has been attacked recently is the lawyer and philanthropist Loida Nicolas Lewis. Perceived to be critical of President Duterte and a supporter of Mar Roxas/Leni Robredo and the Liberal Party, Lewis has been attacked in the press and in social media as a foreigner interfering in Philippine domestic matters. She and other prominent Filipino-Americans have been linked to Robredo in so-called destabilization plots against Duterte. 

This is of course laughable and completely untrue. Loida Nicolas Lewis is a good woman who cares deeply about the country. Her philanthrophy has helped many Filipinos, particularly in her home province Sorsogon where she has invested heavily in improving education. Most of all, Lewis has been a leader in galvanizing Filipino Americans to support the Philippines on its territorial disputes with China and to promote good governance in the country. I am not politically aligned with Lewis but I appreciate and welcome her involvement in the Philippines. I am particularly grateful to Lewis for her sterling leadership in the advocacy to get global Filipinos the right to become dual citizens and to get all such Filipinos, OFWs and dual citizens, the right to vote.

As to the claim that Lewis is a foreigner intervening in local matters, that too does not pass the laugh test (it's so absurd that one has to burst out laughing) and is definitely untrue. Lewis is as Filipino as you and me. It does not matter that she left the country decades ago. It does not matter that she married a lawyer and entrepreneur, the late Reginald Lewis. It does not matter that she became a US citizen after that marriage. The fact is she reacquired her citizenship properly under the Dual Citizenship Act. 

Reacquisition restored to Lewis her Filipino citizenship in all totality, except going into government, which requires her to renounce her American citizenship. Lewis is a dual citizen, holding both Filipino and American citizenship, which is allowed by law. But since dual allegiance is prohibited, Lewis cannot run for or be appointed to office unless she renounces her foreign citizenship. This is what Grace Poe did and she did it by the book. There is no doubt now that Grace Poe is a natural-born citizen, that she reacquired Philippine citizenship properly, that she became a resident of the Philippines again starting 2005, and that she has abandoned her American citizenship both under Philippine and United States laws.

Yasay is stateless

The Yasay case is perplexing. Why did he not do a Grace Poe and take the steps to reacquire his Philippine citizenship once the Dual Citizenship Act was enacted? He did do the renunciation in the United States Embassy in June 2016 before his appointment to the Duterte Cabinet. He could also have reacquired his citizenship before the renunciation and taking office. Perhaps, he truly believed that he never became an American citizen since he claims he never had the intention of staying in the United States thus negating, rendering it null and void from the beginning, the oath of office he had taken to become an American citizen.

Subjective belief aside, the facts are quite clear on Yasay’s citizenship. Born Filipino, he lost his Philippine citizenship when he took an oath as an American. He never became a Filipino citizen again, which could only be done through either repatriation or by reacquition, with the latter conferring on Yasay the status of dual citizenship. When he renounced American citizenship in 2016, in my view, Yasay clearly became stateless. The good news though is that he can easily reacquire Philippine citizenship. It does not take rocket science for him to determine what steps to take to do that. But it requires humility and an admission that you have made a mistake.

Alan Cayetano is a natural-born Filipino

It is as clear as day: Senator Cayetano is a natural-born Filipino. Having renounced properly his American citizenship (I would argue that dual citizens by birth do not have to do this), he is qualified to be senator and to run for or be appointed to any position that required natural-born citizenship.

Alan, Pia and their siblings are all Filipino citizens by birth. They were also all dual citizens when born because of their American mother. None of them had to choose Filipino citizenship at the age of majority. It was not necessary to do so. Whether it’s the 1935, 1973 or 1987 constitutions, all persons born of Filipino fathers are natural-born Filipino citizens. Under the 1935 constitution, children born of Filipino mothers and foreign fathers had to elect Filipino citizenship when they reached the age of majority. That requirement was retained in the 1973 Constitution but only for persons born before January 17, 1973, the effectivity date of the 1973 Constitution. All those born of Filipino parents after that date are automatically Filipino citizens.

For the record, even as we might have differences with the Cayetanos on some issues, we respect their record of service. We remember certainly the contribution of their father, the Senator and Attorney Rene Cayetano, to our national life.

Raising a bogus issue of citizenship against Alan Cayetano is alarming. It reopens again the debate on how global Filipinos should be accommodated in our society. Its time to put a stop to this.

Who are global Filipinos?

What does it mean to be a Filipino? In an attempt to strengthen a unified national identity amid strong regionalism, education policymakers of the Commonwealth period tried to push various markers of Filipino identity: a Filipino language; a Filipino "race" of kayumanggi-skinned people; a common historical national narrative of freedom-loving heroes who fought colonial rule.

This push for a common identity might have hastened the development of a shared Filipino identity. But it also had the unfortunate effect of creating a limited, narrow concept of "Filipino-ness," prioritizing those with "pure" Filipino ethnicity who have never set foot outside the Philippines, whose roots and identity are exclusively Filipino. 

Yet there are many ways of being Filipino. Simply look at its legal definition – anyone who has Filipino citizenship – and we immediately see that Filipinos are not just kayumanggi-skinned people, but also Filipinos of many different ethnicities: Chinese-Filipinos, Indian-Filipinos, Australian-Filipinos, and so forth. It includes not only those whose ancestors have lived on Philippine soil since time immemorial, but also those whose families have only been Filipino for 3 or 4 generations, as well as those who have been naturalized in their lifetimes.

The distinction among Filipinos in our law is only between naturalized and natural-born Filipinos. Our law does not create a hierarchy of Filipino-ness based on language, skin color, or religion. The word "Filipino" fully includes, therefore, those who are Filipino by accident as well as those who are Filipino by choice. It fully includes those whose ancestors are part of the national narrative of Filipino history as well as those who identify with alternative narratives of migration: both immigration and emigration.

More and more of us are global Filipinos. For some of us, it is our family history that made us "global": Filipinos with non-Filipino ancestry; naturalized Filipinos who were formerly foreigners; and dual citizens from birth. For others, it is the choices we have made in our lifetimes that have made us "global": these are the documented and undocumented OFWs; permanent residents of another country; former Filipinos who renounced but subsequently reacquired Filipino citizenships.

As we become more global, we must learn to challenge our own narrow conceptions of Filipino-ness, and learn to fully embrace each and every Filipino.

Beyond the legalistic definition of Filipino, we can also speak of Filipino identity, which is even broader and more inclusive, as it includes even more global Filipinos: the American child with Filipino parents who goes to Tagalog school on Saturdays to learn his parents' language; the young European mestiza with a Filipino mother who visits the Philippines to learn more about her roots; the Japanese husband who has lived in the Philippines for decades, building his life here with his Filipina spouse: as long as they identify as such, they are Filipinos too.

Moving forward with liberal approach

In trying to define the nation, Benedict Anderson described nations as "imagined communities": referring to our capacity to imagine a kinship and shared identity with people we have never met before, and with whom we have no blood relations. Those of us who have met or been global Filipinos know this well: the smile of recognition we give to a stranger in an American supermarket when we hear her speaking in a Philippine language to her children, or being called the familiar "Ate" or "Kuya" by a stranger on a European train. Global Filipino-ness does not detract from our identity; it enriches it, stretching the boundaries of our nation.

In a world where Filipinos are everywhere, where our diaspora has no boundaries, it is time to take a liberal approach on Filipino citizenship.

We might want to consider abandoning the natural-born citizenship requirement for most government positions, keeping it only for the President and Vice President and abolish it for everyone else. In the case of dual citizens, we might want to abandon the requirement of renunciation of foreign citizenship to take on most government positions, perhaps again retaining it only for the highest offices.

We need our global Filipinos to engage with the country. Let us make sure we give them the opportunity to do that.– Rappler.com

Tony La Viña is former dean of the Ateneo School of Government. Rowena Azada-Palacios is an assistant professor of philosophy at Ateneo de Manila University.

When I resigned from the House of Representatives in March 2015 owing to principled differences with the previous administration, including then President Aquino’s obstinate refusal to accept command responsibility for the Mamasapano debacle, the final appeal in my farewell speech to my colleagues was for them to pass the Bangsa Moro Basic Law since it was, in my opinion, “our last best hope for achieving lasting peace in Mindanao.”

The BBL collapsed, derailed by Mamasapano, Aquino’s stupid, self-inflicted wound, and the opportunistic, incendiary Christian chauvinist rhetoric of demagogues like Senator Alan Peter Cayetano. The peace process ground to a halt, and when President Duterte assumed power, what replaced it was vague talk about federalism and equally vague plans about bringing the different Moro insurgent groups together to collectively negotiate a peace agreement with the government.

Federalism has, so far, been empty talk because it was never more than an empty, though seductive, idea in Duterte’s mind.  As for Duterte’s plan to have the government negotiate collectively with all the Moro factions, this naïve idea, as Mindanao expert, Professor Nathan Quimpo of Tsukuba University, predicted, has simply wasted valuable time since there is no way these rival groups are going to seat together at the same table. 

Politics, however, does not stand still, and the hiatus in the peace process has led mainly to the loss of credibility for the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the previous administration’s negotiating partner, and the shifting of the momentum to the ISIS-linked groups like the Abu Sayyaf and the Mautes.  

Marawi: Waiting to happen

To those following increasingly alarming trends in Western Mindanao, Marawi was an event waiting to happen.

Now Duterte, in panic, has opted for the military solution and compounded this mistake by calling for US military assistance, which is precisely what the radical Islamists want, in order to gain more recruits for their jihad. True, Duterte inherited a problem, but he has made it worse with his policies or, more appropriately, non-policies.

The Duterte base will, Mocha-like, unquestioningly follow der Fuhrer and see his problems as brought about by imagined “dilawan” plots or sabotage by disloyal elements in the AFP unwilling to deliver a victory for their president. Impatient for magical solutions, they find it hard to understand that military force cannot solve problems which demand political solutions. They fail to comprehend that a massive military reversal brought about by a political debacle cannot be conjured away by resorting to empty-headed nationalist sloganeering like, “By June 12, the flag of the Philippines will once more fly proudly over Marawi City.” 

It is doubtful that these fanatics will be brought to their senses even when, God forbid, their counterparts on the other side, the radical Islamists, bring their campaign of systematic terror to the national capital region. 

End of the Democratic Republic?

With the BBL for all intents and purposes dead, there is no easy solution in sight. The only thing that is clear is that the government has no choice but to go back to square one and work to achieve a political settlement, no matter now difficult that may be. 

The problem is that, despite the lessons of Marawi, the Duterte crew does not realize it has a problem, and is convinced that there is nothing that more firepower, martial law, and more drunken boasts about “smashing the enemy” will not solve. With their policy disarray in so many areas, from foreign affairs to economic strategy to poverty alleviation, the Duterte gang is set to accomplish no mean feat: outstrip the previous Aquino administration in incompetent governance. 

But then, this is not unexpected since this president came to power with only one clear policy: to indiscriminately kill off thousands of people suspected of drug use.  

With his deadly mix of incompetence, policy fiascos, and authoritarian ambitions, Duterte may yet preside over the collapse of the democratic republic and, along with it, the dismemberment of the Philippine nation-state.

To some, that may come across as divine retribution for a citizenry that foolishly voted a mass murderer to power. To those who are not theologically inclined, however, it underlines the urgency of citizen action to avert our country’s spiralling descent into the abyss. – Rappler.com

Walden Bello made the only recorded resignation on principle from Congress in March 2015 owing to his refusal to countenance the policies of the Aquino III administration.  Currently professor of sociology at the State University of New York at Binghamton, he is the author or co-author of 20 books on the Philippines, Asia, and global political economy.

Let me get this straight: Rodrigo Duterte is a settler from Mindanao.  

He is the president of the country narrating "Mindanao" to the Nation. The country listens in awe and submission. He is, as supporters and his band of propagandists claim, the first president from the island and therefore the first Filipino leader who can truly understand the "Mindanao problem" better than any previous presidents who either came from the island of Luzon, in the Visayas, or from "Imperial Manila." He alone possesses this privilege that he is born, raised, and built his political career – a dynasty, in fact – with his family in Davao City. 

So when Duterte placed the entire island under martial law last May, everybody agreed that it was the best solution to the looming terrorist takeover of Marawi City. How can you contradict the decision of someone who knows Mindanao like the back of his hand? Supporters were quick to defend the decision and, days later, came the destructive airstrikes, looting, civilian deaths, displacements, and, to my horror, even rape jokes as an instrument of warfare.

Filipinos from Luzon, Manila, and from other islands in the Visayas who experienced first-hand violence during Martial Law under Ferdinand Marcos, Duterte’s model president, gagged on statements coming from Duterte supporters buffered with “I am from Mindanao…” It is a statement so powerful, it can silence any Filipinos outside Mindanao who do not possess the privilege to speak in behalf of Marawi City, of Mindanao. In a country separated by islands, people are territorial. And we all know, as an unwritten rule, that if you are not from this island, from this territory, you know nothing. It is a convenient counter-argument that reeks of essentialism so it’s better for others to shut up. 

But let me tell you this or, perhaps the more appropriate, remind you of this: Duterte and his narrative of Mindanao to the Nation is just one of the 3 narratives from this island, which has long been the battleground for various resistance groups – from freedom fighters with legitimate causes, private armies, violent folk messianic groups, and now terrorists. Mindanao's narratives – between Moro, settlers, and indigenous groups who are neither Moro nor Filipino settlers – have been won by people who wanted to bring lasting peace to region. Duterte and his supporters are dangerously amending this victory by homogenizing Mindanao’s narratives and assigning a representative voice that will speak to the Nation: that of the settler’s.  

Settler’s narrative

Settlers from the Visayan islands and Luzon started migrating to Mindanao during the Spanish colonial period. The peasant migration was heightened during the American period, specifically when Moro and indigenous people’s ancestral lands were legally grabbed to cater to the needs of wealthy landowners and their expanding haciendas. Filipino and foreign landowners and capitalists closer to the colonial masters established several settler communities on the island. 

Settler migration continued post-US occupation as several lands were offered as "lupang pangako" (promised land) for communist leaders who surrendered to the government. Lands in Mindanao were used as bargaining chip to curtail the spread of communism in the archipelago during the early stage of the Cold War. 

Since the Spanish colonial period, Moros and the indigenous people were displaced from their lands. Various settler communities were established while the country was struggling to create its Grand Narrative as a Nation. More than the lands, Moro and indigenous people’s histories, cultures, and the narratives of their aspirations as people were displaced, appropriated, silenced, muted to give way to the single grand narration of this Nation: that we are a homogenous nation.

The Moro's armed resistance to colonial domination, a centuries-old struggle that predates even the Philippines and the United States, reached our time in the late 1960s when Moros started to reclaim and negotiate not just their ancestral lands but also their histories and cultures, and assert their muted voices in the narration of Mindanao within and outside of the Nation. 

The victory of peace advocates, freedom fighters, and well-intentioned leaders in the past provided several pockets of spaces for indigenous people and Moros to narrate their own versions of Mindanao. Since then Mindanao’s argument against escalating and real conflict is the tri-people’s narrative of this lives, histories, cultures, and aspirations as Mindanaoans. The Duterte regime is displacing this hard-fought framework, mainstreaming and imposing a singular voice to narrate Mindanao to the Nation: that of the settler’s. 

‘I am from Mindanao’ buffer statement

This is a historical revisionism of settler’s migration and of the eventual displacements of Moros and indigenous in the histories of Mindanao. By invoking "I am from Mindanao" to silence dissent from Filipinos from Luzon and the Visayas, the President engages in the endless reconstruction and deconstruction of Mindanao’s histories.

"I am from Mindanao" is a paradox. It is an unspoken admittance of a fear that phantoms from Luzon and the Visayas will invoke an invitation of a return, of eventual abandonment; a fear that will highlight the Moros and indigenous peoples groups' narration of their legitimate claim to this space and time called "Mindanao." It is an articulation of the settler's fear and insecurity, as this narrative is perpetually doomed to be in a struggle to occupy a space and time as its own home – the Nation sustains their life, the promise of a permanence.

"I am from Mindanao" cannot exist without the Nation's narration of a homogenous Philippines. 

Duterte’s appropriation of the Bangsamoro struggle

I remember from conversations with Moro colleagues that, during the election campaign last year, Duterte claimed Maranao ancestry, that Maranao blood runs in his bloodline as a product of an intermarriage. The Dutertes of Davao trace their power and lineage to a powerful political family in Cebu. Like other Visayans in Mindanao, Duterte is a settler.  

What is astonishing is how Duterte and his propagandists appropriated the Bangsamoro struggle and narrate it the Nation and to the world – an appropriation made legitimate not just by "I am from Mindanao" but by the argument that he has a "Maranao blood."

A settler cannot and will not articulate the narratives of the Bangsamoro struggle unless he or she addresses first the location of the settler's voice, including the language of this voice, in the grand narration of the Nation.

The narrative of the struggle – or any struggle for that matter – is not in the blood. It is in the collective memories of those who were part of the struggle, memories that eventually became the language of resistance. To keep this narrative intact and relevant for several generations, we have to collectively protect these memories and the language that carries the struggle. The bearers of the narratives are also soldiers that will guard these with their lives.

Blood is biological. What Duterte claims is biological, nature. Language, memories, and narratives are constructs that can be negotiated: there is leverage for power to be diffused, shared, or even captured; there is that possibility for resistance and the struggle is legitimate. "May dugo siyang Maranao" is a problematic essentialism. It runs counter to the several narrative strands of the Bangsamoro struggle, which is either nationalist, Islamic, or hybrid of the two that navigates between the goals of independence or autonomy.

Duterte's version of "Mindanao" is of the settler's alone. And this version is with the approval of the Center, that's why it is easier for us in Manila and for other Filipinos in other parts of the country to read, access, and accept his version without any critical engagement. "I am from Mindanao" is from the language of the settler's defense to any critique or attempt for a critical discourse that will challenge the legitimacy and position of settler's version of Mindanao in the grand narration of the Nation. "Duterte is Mindanao" is like a selfie: objectifying our narcissism, this craving for seeing only our face and then presenting it later to the approving public as a legitimate version of ourselves.

Who’s dividing this country now?

Moros are people who have been in a struggle for centuries. The distribution of and access to power has always been unequal. To articulate and even to entertain the thought that the people of Marawi City are complacent partners to the terrorists and that they deserve this debacle is to welcome this question on the possibility of equal distribution and access to power in a struggle. Why can't we give them the real freedom and their right to self-determination so they can build their own government, a government that will and can protect their interests?

Mindanao is a national issue and requires national discussion. People from Luzon and other parts of the country should never be deprived of participation in the public dialogues and should be encouraged by leaders to continuously interrogate the country’s history and Mindanao’s relevance to the formation of this archipelago’s several nations. To use "I am from Mindanao" and to "settlerjack" Mindanao’s narrative and narration will result to further divisions, reopening of old wounds, and conflicts.    

The Philippine celebrated this week the anniversary of the declaration of its independence. Let me ask you again this question as this regime promises a "liberation of Marawi" as part of the grand parade for the entire country to witness: Ilang Moro pa ang kailangan mo para maging Filipino ka? – Rappler.com 

Playwright and novelist Rogelio Braga is the author of the novels Colon, Ang Lihim ng Nakasimangot na Maskara and a book of plays Sa Pagdating ng Barbaro at Iba Pang mga Dula. His several plays on Filipino-Moro relations have been performed by the UP Repertory Company in various places in the country including in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. He is currently dividing his time between Phnom Penh and Ho Chi Minh cities as a fellow of the Asian Cultural Council for theater in Southeast Asia researching on the narratives of the refugees, migrants, and the dispossessed.  

We have another name for this conflict: Abdillah Dimangampong Masid.

He was a 14-year old boy, a 6th grader from Datu Saber Elementary School in Marawi City. 

Last Friday, June 9, Abdillah was shot dead by an unknown sniper's bullet. We do not know if this is – that ultimate oxymoron – friendly fire, we do not know if he was shot by the terrorists who continue to hold our bereaved city of Marawi in siege.  

Abdillah was a young boy, a Maranao, a Moro, and a pious Muslim in that order. He, or what was left of him, was buried on the same day his life was taken away from him. He was presented to an ogling crowd the day after, an empty shell, a void.

Death terminates all. The possibilities of what his life could have been were unjustly taken away. Abdillah, the young Muslim shot by a sniper inside the mosque were he was obediently performing his midday prayers with his family, is a death neither to be memorialzed nor dishonored, but to be remembered.

This war deprived Abdillah of the possibility of seeing his beloved city return from conflict, rebuilt by his fellow Muslim Meranaos from ruins, like his ancestors did for several centuries as they resisted colonial rule. 

We have run out of words to explain to him why his city is being reduced to ruins, and his neighbors clinging to whatever dignity they have left as they crowd themselves in evacuation centers, while the state performs its obligation to protect his country's sovereignty against terrorists.

Abdillah will no longer see the lifting of martial rule in Mindanao. He will hear no nuanced explanations from people aged by wisdom on how to mend this country's wounds and divisiveness. He was deprived of seeing the possibility of peace, reconciliation, healing. Abdillah was deprived of the possibility of experiencing a peaceful country where human rights, dignity, respect, and protection of vulnerable communities are upheld, a country that we are creating now, as of this writing, for our children.

When I first saw the picture of Abdillah's dead body, my eyes were drawn to his bloodied face. Young, lifeless, his body lying on the floor half covered by a prayer mat that he was using perhaps, before that unknown sniper ended his Friday prayer, and all other prayers that he may have uttered. Abdillah could have been myself, or the women weeping beside his body, or my mother, or my sisters. How this picture created a tableau that froze life, hope, suffering, sorrow, and the termination of all possibilities will haunt me for years.

Abdillah was deprived of learning how suffering can become a gesture, an act of pushing life's limits until we become human, all too human until we are numbed by exhaustion. He was deprived of seeing how compassion can translate into something more accessible and tangible for everyone to read, as much as blind patriotism. 

Weight of his absence

Perhaps, maybe, what if – these were the words that flooded my mind on that day after the Friday prayer. I performed my prayer with him even as I was in another place; because we Muslims look at the same sky when we pray. This world deprived Abdillah of hearing one of the most important words in a Muslim’s vocabulary, a word that frames and provides hope for the Bangsamoro aspirations, a struggle that was passed on to him by ancestors centuries before his birth – and his death: Salam.

Tomorrow is another day for Abdillah’s family and for all of us spectators. Except for his family, we will all go back to our daily routines. There will be an absence, an empty space in his family’s home, inside his community’s mosque, in the classroom where he used to sit as a young Muslim student full of possibilities in life. The weight of his absence is heavier perhaps than the freedom Moros are enjoying as Filipinos. 

What I refuse to accept is the warmongers' logic that unnamed bullets should leave the dead unnamed. That tomorrow, or the day after, social media's wall will refresh with new dead bodies, new Abdillahs presented to the public. I refuse to accept that.

The bullet that murdered Abdillah Dimangampong Masid had a very clear target, and it was not unnamed. That piece of metal that pierced Abdillah's skin and penetrated his marrow was named "fear." Its target: all the young Muslims celebrating their Ramadan, longing for peace, salam, to finally come into their lives.

They murdered Abdillah but not his Islam.

Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un (We belong to Allah and to Him we shall return). – Rappler.com 

Amir Mawallil, is a member of the Young Moro Professionals Network (YMPN), the country's biggest organization of Muslim professionals

Though Philippine government forces are actually fighting in Marawi City a unified armed groups that have pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the group that inevitably stands out in the ongoing military conflict is the Maute Group.    

The Maute Group is brazenly taking the center stage in the ongoing firefights because the main battlefield is Marawi City, the stronghold of the Maute family and the only Islamic city in the Philippines. This armed group holds this label because the whole Maute family is involved in the establishment of an ISIS-linked organization that their followers call the Daulah Islamiyah Fi Ranao (DIFR) or the Islamic State of Lanao. The Maute family proclaimed the DIFR in September 2014 after performing a bay’ah or a pledge allegiance to ISIS leader, Abu Bakar Baghdadi. 

To advance ISIS activities in the provinces of Lanao, the Maute Group formed two highly trained armed groups called Khilafah sa Jabal Uhod(Soldiers of the Caliphate in Mouth Uhod) and Khilafah sa Ranao (Soldiers of the Caliphate in Lanao) headed by the Middle-East educated Maute brothers: Omarkayam Maute and Abdullah Maute.  The family organized a clandestine fortress on behalf of ISIS in its hometown in Butig, Lanao del Sur, and other satellite camps in the neighboring towns of Lumbatan, Lambuyanague, Marogong, Masiu,and even Marawi City.

In February 2016, the Maute Group demonstrated its first barbaric act of terror when it beheaded a Philippine army officer in Butig. In April 2016, the Maute Group beheaded two Christian workers on behalf of the ISIS.

In Butig, the Maute Group was able to set up military camps with complete training facilities for combatants, bombers, community organizers and religious preachers. In fact, most of the suspects in the September 2016 Davao City bombing received bomb trainings in Butig where the Maute family initially organized an army of at least 300 ISIS fighters recruited from disgruntled members of families previously associated with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).  

In November 2016, the Philippine military conducted military operations in Butig to retake the town from the Maute Group’s operational control.

Umbrella organization 

But from Butig, the Maute Group just discreetly formed several hideouts in Marawi City with the intention of controlling the whole city to serve as the headquarters of the Maute-supported the Daulah Islamiya Wilayatul Mashriq (DIWM), the so-called Islamic State Province in East Asia.

The DIWM is the umbrella organization of all armed groups in the Philippines that have pledged allegiance to ISIS.

Among the notorious armed groups in the DIWM are factions of the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) as well as remnants of the Anshar Khalifa Philippines (AKP) and the Khilafa Islamiyah Mindanao (KIM). ASG commander Isnilon Hapilon serves as the overall leader or Amir of DIWM, whose members are called by ISIS as the Soldiers of the Caliphate in East Asia.  

Contrary to various reports, government forces are fighting in Marawi City not only the Maute Group but also other armed groups under the DIWM. There is no doubt, however, that key officials of DIWM are members of the Maute family.    

The Maute family enjoys many starring roles in the DIWM because of its current military strength, financial profile and political status. 

Abullah Maute serves as the vice chairman for military operations while Omarkayam Maute serves as the vice chairman for political affairs. Mohammad Khayam Maute heads operation and intelligence. Detained Cayamora Maute, father, and the recently arrested Farhana Maute, mother, are in charge of finance and logistics while other Maute brothers are identified as key leaders of the DIWM.

The formation of the Maute Group is, in fact, indicative of the rise of family terrorism in the Philippines.  

Family: Easier recruitment

Family terrorism is a new global phenomenon involving family members in various acts of terrorism.  The killing, for example, of 49 people at a gay club in Orlando, Florida in May 2016 was a product of family terrorism. Omar Mateen, the gunman, was the son of parents who fought for the Al-Qaeda linked Taliban in Afghanistan.  

ISIS is, in fact, encouraging terrorism in families experiencing frustrations, marginalization, and relative deprivation. ISIS prefers members of the family to get involved because family terrorism eases the recruitment process and it effectively reduces the risk of betrayals. Bringing members from the same family increases strong loyalty to terrorist organizations and solidifies organizational relationships.

The Maute Group is called as such because the entire family has been accused of various involvements in crimes associated with terrorism: illegal possession of firearms, illegal manufacturing of explosives, kidnapping, extortion, money laundering, illegal drug trades, and others. 

Because terrorism runs in the family, the Maute Group was able to establish a strong discipline among members who are considered part of the “family” of jihadists.

Maute's reputation

Because the Maute Group is an integral part of a larger group, the DIWM, it has developed a potent force to multiply violence.  

The Maute Group’s military performance in the current battle in Marawi City is a strong indication of its strength and virulence. Foreign fighters from Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Central Asia and even Xinjiang in China are attracted to join the DIWM because of the excellent reputation of the Maute Group.  Even ASG leader Hapilon went down to Marawi City from Basilan for forge unity with the Maute Group in its attempt to strengthen the DIWM.

Like ISIS, the Maute Group has a violent extremist worldview, which currently flows in the blood of family members. It takes more than military actions to counter this worldview, which justifies recruitment to their jihadist cause.  

The Philippine government needs to immediately develop innovative non-military countermeasures that can offer alternative narratives to the twisted yet alluring worldview of violent extremism. 

Otherwise, unintended consequences of ongoing military actions by the government can unnecessarily provide a fertile ground for the further propagation of violent extremism not only in Mindanao but also in the entire Philippines and its neighbors in East Asia. – Rappler.com

[Sing to the tune of Rihanna's "Umbrella"]

Now that it's raining more than ever
Hanep na ang cuddle weather
Sana may space ang payong niya
Sana may space ang payong niya
(Niya niya niya eh eh eh)
May space ang payong niya
(Niya niya niya eh eh eh)
May space ang payong niya
(Niya niya niya eh eh eh)
May space ang payong niya

#FridayFeels is a cartoon series by the Rappler Creatives Team. Cathartic, light, but relevant, it's a welcome break from your heavy news feed! You can pitch illustration ideas by sending a message to the Rappler Facebook page.

My fingers tremble as I sit down to write about what I see and hear. But the lives of people are at stake, so I must write.

Every minute someone is dying in Marawi while aerial strikes pound the once listless city. Every moment that passes by, the breathing of one surviving trapped resident in the war ghettos of the endangered downtown in Marawi City thins by the day. (READ: Marawi under siege: It's like 'looking at Aleppo')

A co-volunteer in the Ranao Rescue Team updates us about a trapped resident who has been eating paper cartons for meals. Twenty-three days have gone by and no food is available. Every house and shop is closed, and the once-bustling Islamic City has become a zombie city. (READ: Marawi: Images from a ghost town)

This was a result of the shock of armed confrontation on our national highway on May 23. The story is that radicals were in one religious gathering of males at a big mosque in Basak Malutlut. Security forces were going to take suspects in custody. The Maute Group resisted and the highway became a no-man's land. Many people fled without any bag or clothes.

We, Meranaos, are being blamed for the Marawi crisis that has displaced almost 300,000 and counting. Terrorism in Marawi City is a stranger because radicals usually meet underground. This is the first time they surfaced in the city as a group. I know this because I am part of a security monitoring group that has monitored incidents of violence by the MG. They have done sporadic crimes against Shiites, gays, men in uniform, and suspected intelligence agents. (READ: Filipino millennial joins ISIS in Syria)

We have religiously convened multi-sectoral meetings on combating crime and terrorism with fellow member newscasters speaking against radicalism almost every week. (READ: One with Marawi)

Once magical

It is Baguio-cool here, the Lake Lanao is majestic. Listening to the call to prayer 5 times a day was magical. All this has changed in one instant.

Marawi is the seat and capital for 39 villages, a future capital of a Bangsamoro too. The Mindanao State University main campus is here with a majority Christian student population and was declared a peace zone, an effort we pushed while at the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao in 2012. Muslims and Christians here live side by side.

It is Baguio-cool here, the Lake Lanao is majestic. Listening to the call to prayer 5 times a day was magical. Robust interfaith movements and peace activities are hosted here. There was conscious effort to invest in understanding violence.

So please do not tell us we did not do anything. Dear President, please do not blame the Meranaos.

We would not even have wanted to dignify his usually sarcastic statements but this is a time of suffering and call for oneness as a nation. Instead, we would have wanted he visit evacuation centers and see the mothers and children sleeping on floors and elderly survivors who continued fasting despite the odds. (READ: Duterte cancels Marawi visit due to 'foul weather')

We are a society that has survived 400 years and battled colonizers from America and Japan and asserted our unique identity in the 1935 Dansalan Declaration.

Despite being vanguard of the peace here, Marawi saw a horrific martial law take away 150,000 lives in the 1970s in Mindanao – a nightmare of destruction.

Imagine if in Manila if we conducted air strikes.

Unanswered questions

How did the conflict really start on May 23? What is the number of soldiers serving and how many are the enemies? Does ground command follow high command on peace? (READ: PH honors 'heroes of Marawi' with noontime salute)

Was there forced evacuation? What is the policy for civilian protection? How to avoid collateral damage on human lives?

How is the Maute group targeted? What equipment? How did the US Special Forces use forward observers and missile guided rockets during air strikes? (READ: Soldiers killed in military air strike in Marawi)

Just like the Abu Sayyaf that has infested the islands, it is not our choice that radicals have grown here in Marawi City. (READ: Duterte's challenges: Terror, crime and the Abu Sayyaf)

We urge the President to be more circumspect and compassionate about the suffering of fellow Filipinos who are doubly sacrificing as evacuees and fasting faithfuls.

As Commander-in-Chief, he must invest in stronger law enforcement measures, educate people on the rule of law and support the judiciary and ulama in their campaign for justice and Shariah.

We are not in charge of checkpoints. We are not authorities who can, with the use of technology, monitor suspicious actions and the entry of high-powered arms.

We urge he invest in civilian military relations instead of treating this as a movie of who wins and who loses. – Rappler.com

Samira Gutoc lives in Bangon, just a village away from the fighting of May 23. She is a focal person for Ranao Rescue Team that works on facilitating rescue, relief, legal, and medical assistance for Marawi residents.

Nobody likes graded recitations. You prepare hard. But you pray hard anyway that you won't be called. And still you get called and asked the most difficult question. Then everything you thought you already knew fades out. 

That is before you yourself fade out.  

I dreaded graded recitations too when I was a student. To me they caused unnecessary stress. It would have been nicer if discussions were spontaneous. But somehow I understood why some teachers liked giving graded recitations. It's a trick of the trade to compel students to read.  

But there's so much more to it. 

Without students realizing it, classroom discussions – graded or otherwise – train them to be good citizens. The classroom, after all, is a space where ideas are presented and then challenged among its participants. In this environment, ideas are made robust by active participation, not fear. 

This is how education, if done well, could shape the future of citizenship. For the philosopher John Dewey, education cannot be a mechanical space where skills are acquired only to make them functional laborers. Instead, the curriculum must assume a social responsibility for students to tackle "problems of living together".

Democracy and critical thinking

Democracy also assumes a social responsibility. It is not just about having elections and a stable government. Democracy's endurance lies in people's willingness to participate to achieve collective wisdom to address troubles we are faced with. 

It is thus a way of life. The only problem is that participation is contentious. 

And yet any other alternative is less desirable.   

Think about it: a government that demands its citizens to only pay their taxes and not question its decisions is an insecure government. Politicians who tell critics to shut up are likely unwilling to expose their ignorance. The same goes for folks on social media who resort to ad hominem when they don't like what they see.

They all forget that democracy demands collective participation. Collective participation, if it were to take its social responsibility seriously, demands critical thinking. That is hard. 

The issues we have these days are endless: Martial Law, ISIS, federalism, China, the peace process, and the war on drugs. We have poverty, unemployment, and homelessness to boot. To tackle all these issues is far beyond the ability of one man, party, or regime. 

And yet for some reason, dissent has become obnoxious these days. In fact, tolerance of dissent has become so low that those who simply ask questions are readily dismissed as enemies of the state: Human rights activists are meddlesome. Journalists are spreading fake news. Academics are useless armchair analysts. 

Participation that exacts only uniformity and subservience endangers the very society it wishes to serve. It might appear efficient and decisive. But not for long. The death of critical thinking engenders an ignorant society.      

Way forward

Dissent is such a loaded word. That partly explains why supporters of this administration find critics repulsive. They are of the opinion that critics get in the way of progress. 

Their conviction is that "hindi umaasenso ang bayan dahil maraming kontrabida". 

That might be somewhat true because dissenters slow things down. 

But many of us do not necessarily want to slow things down. We ask questions because we are simply being good citizens. By asking tough questions, we encourage critical thinking among our leaders. It is in this manner that democracy, as a way of life, can hold citizens accountable to each other.   

Is martial law the only option? Is free tuition fee the wisest intervention? How reliable is federalism? Is the war on drugs truly effective? 

At the same time, we can direct our questions at each other: How objective are our journalists? Why are trolls so pervasive and who finances them? What interests are being protected by academics? And how credible are human rights activists?  

These are all tough questions and there is no single answer. Thankfully, ours is a democratic society. We must take advantage of our liberties to shape the quality of our conversations and decisions. 

We must also use our liberties to arrest those who wish to take them away from us. It is not only through martial law that our liberties are stolen from us. Without us realizing it, this atmosphere that limits critical thinking takes away from us our greatest facility as a people: our intellect.

Critical thinking is needed more than ever in our country. But may it not be to demonstrate erudition or eloquence. We need it because in a democratic society such as ours, genuine progress rests upon mutual accountability. 

Graded recitations are scary. But the decline of critical thinking is far scarier. – Rappler.com

Jayeel Serrano Cornelio, PhD, is a visiting professor at the Department of Sociology at Mindanao State University - Iligan Institute of Technology. He is the National Academy of Science and Technology's 2017 Outstanding Young Scientist in the field of sociology. Follow him on Twitter @jayeel_cornelio. 

Naniniwala ako na ang pamunuan ng bagong tatag na Counter Intelligence Task Force (CITF) ng Philippine National Police (PNP) ay marubrob ang pagnanais na mawalis, kundi man nila mapatino, ang mga tiwaling pulis sa kanilang organisasyon. Ngunit sa wari ko ay parang nabibilaukan na sila sa dami ng sumbong at reklamong kanilang natatanggap laban sa kanilang mga kabaro.

Sabi nga ng isang nakausap kong counter-intelligence operative, tungkol sa problema nila sa mga tiwaling pulis: “Para silang punong nakahapay na at mahirap nang maituwid kung hindi mo bubunutin sa kinatataniman!” Nakatatakot na pananalita, dahil alam kong ang puno, kapag binubunot mula sa kinatataniman nito, ay hindi na nabubuhay pa…shades of “tokhang” ba? 'Wag naman sana kasi, para sa akin, kahit pulis pa sila, dapat hulihin, kasuhan, at ikulong na lang kapag napatunayang may kasalanan. Kailan pa ba naituwid ng isa pang pagkakamali ang nauna nang kamalian?

Malabon cops

Tukso namang habang nagkukuwentuhan kami kamakailan sa Camp Crame ng aking kaibigan, isang text message ang kanyang natanggap hinggil sa pagkakaaresto sa 4 na pulis sa Malabon dahil sa kasong mala-“Ninja-type kidnapping/extortion” na ilang araw na ring tinatrabaho ng kanyang grupo.

Isang beteranong intel-operative ang aking kausap. Ang pagtitiwala niya sa akin na kuwentuhan ng kanilang confidential operations ay dahil marahil sa di ko pagbanggit sa kanyang pangalan ni minsan man sa mga artikulong aking isinusulat, lalo pa’t siya ang may malaking papel sa tinatrabaho.

Hindi ko sinayang ang pagkakataon upang makuha ang detalye ng kanilang naging operasyong ma-rescue ang isang biktima ng kidnapping/extortion at masakote ang 4 sa 11 suspek na mga aktibong pulis pala. Tuloy ang operasyon para maaresto ang iba pang mga suspek. Nang makuha ko sa kanya ang mga detalye ng kanilang operasyon, nakita kong isa itong malaking halimbawa kung bakit may mga pulis pa ring nahihikayat na makisawsaw sa ganitong uri ng ilegal na pagkakakitaan.

Malaking halaga kasi ang pinag-uusapan sa tulad nitong parang isang lehitimong operasyon ng mga pulis na pinagkakakitaan pa nila ng milyones. At kapag nakalusot, may pera nang nakurakot, may commendation pang nakukuha, lalo pa’t ang tinatrabaho ay hinggil sa droga na nagbibigay ng mataas na puntos ngayon sa mga operating unit sa PNP. Ito ang nagbibigay ng lakas ng loob nila, 'wag lang masasakote gaya ng nangyari kamakailan.

Girlfriend

Ang tinarget ng grupong ito ay ang girlfriend ng isang nakakulong na pusher/car thief sa Medium Security Compound sa Bilibid. Sinundan daw ng grupo ang mga lakad ng girlfriend, na binansagan ng CITF na si "@Norma," at dinukot nila ito noong isang Sabado, matapos na dalawin sa kulungan ang boyfriend niyang si Raymond Bongabon. Kinontak ng mga suspek ang pamilya ni "@Norma" at sinabihang magbayad ng P2 milyong pampiyansa dahil sa pagkakaaresto nito sa pagtutulak ng droga. Ang piyansang sinasabi ay “ransom” na pala dahil nakuha pa ng mga suspek na pumunta sa bahay ni "@Norma" sa Veterans Village sa Quezon City, pinaghahakot ang mga mamahaling kagamitan ng biktima, at isinakay sa van na tinangay na rin nila.

Nagkaroon pa ng negosasyon sa hinihinging “ransom” – nagkasundo sila sa P1 milyon. Ang boyfriend na si Bongabon ang magpapadala ng pera, ngunit di natuloy ang itinakdang pay-off. Sa halip na kunin ang ransom na P1 milyon, pinag-delicer na lang ng mga tiwaling pulis si "@Norma" ng isang kilong shabu sa isang dating customer daw ng boyfriend nito na isang negosyanteng Chinese. Natuloy ang bentahan ng isang kilong shabu sa isang hotel sa Novaliches, Quezon City, kinalingguhan, ngunit nabaligtad ang sitwasyon: si "@Norma" ang kanilang pinalabas na naaresto, at ang ebidensiya laban dito ay ang drogang ipina-deliver nila rito.

Ang hindi nila alam, sa umpisa pa lamang ng kanilang paghingi ng ransom ay nakipag-ugnayan na sa CITF ang mga kamag-anak ni "@Norma." Agad na naglatag ang CITF ng isang malawakang operasyon katulong ang iba pang operating unit ng PNP, gaya ng Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG), Northern Police district (NPD), Malabon City Police Station (MCPS), Anti-Kidnapping Group (AKG), Highway Patrol Group (HPG), at Command Security Group (CSG).

Galit na galit si NPD District Director Roberto Fajardo nang makarating sa kanya ang reklamo. Kahit na hindi pa naaaresto ang mga tiwaling pulis ay agad na niyang ipinasibak ang mga ito. Inutusan niya ang kanyang mga tauhan na makipagtulungan sa mga operatiba ng CITF para madakip agad ang mga tiwaling pulis na pawang miyembro ng Drug Enforcement Unit (DEU) ng MCPS.

Bago lumubog ang araw nang araw na iyon, nasakote ang 4 sa 11 pinaghahanap na mga tiwaling pulis. Ang 4 sa kanila – sina SPO2 Ricky Pelicano, PO2 Wilson Sanchez, PO1 Joselito Ereneo, at PO1 Francis Camu – ay pawang mga miyembro ng MCPS-DEU. Ang 7 pang pulis, na napag-alamang mga miyembro naman ng CIDG at CSG, ay nakatakas matapos makaramdam na may mga operatibang dadakma sa kanila. Sinibak na rin sa puwesto ang mga ito, at kasalukuyang nakalatag ang isang malawakang operasyon upang madakip sila.

Dapat gawing sampol ang mga tiwaling pulis na ito para hindi na pamarisan – hindi nang mala-tokhang na parusa, kundi 'yung karapat-dapat lamang at naaayon sa itinakda ng batas. – Rappler.com

It is easier to label President Rodrigo Duterte as a populist with an authoritarian tan. It sets him apart from his predecessors, but it also makes it easy to his supporters and, oddly, observers (academic and pundit) to explain away his resilient connections with his followers with minimal need for elaboration. “Ganyan talaga ’yan si Digong (Digong is really like that),” so enough said.

After 100 days in office, however, just invoking how much of a singular man of prowess the President is, or how he is the Jeanne D’Arc who is out to save the Republic from drug addicts and supporters of former President Benigno Aquino III, is becoming old hat. The myth is nevertheless well sustained by fake news, the adept use of social media by Duterte fans, and the showbiz aura of Mocha Uson.

Remove all these layers and what you have is a leader who has very little difference from a lot of local strongmen and bosses who have been the foundation of the political system. Duterte fans the oligarchy, and claims that he “doesn’t consider himself part of the Philippine ruling class or the feudal system.” But his disdain for the old elite (Aquino?) is also matched by his slobbering admiration of the parvenu elites who emerged after World War II, the most prominent of which is the Marcos family. That praise has to do much with family biography.

The Dutertes were one of the 3 families that lorded over Davao for most of the second half of the 20th century (the others were the Almendras clan before martial law, and the Floirendos – prominent local cronies of President Marcos – during the dictatorship era). The Dutertes were migrants from Danao, Cebu, where Digong’s father had his first taste of politics when President Manuel Roxas appointed him mayor of the city. Vicente Duterte, however, could not spread his wings since, given the sinecure. Danao was the fiefdom of his cousin, Don Ramon Durano. Durano – a former WWII guerilla-like Marcos – had claimed the town as the clan’s base of power, and Vicente had no choice but to look elsewhere to further his political ambitions. 

He found the continuation of his calling in Davao, then one the major landing points of migrants from Central Visayas, many of them fellow Cebuanos like the Dutertes. Vicente jump-started his career by offering his legal services to settlers battling each other and the lumad over land ownership. This was an excellent way to establish a presence (who would not have their property titled?). The Mindanao Times, Davao’s longest running newspaper, was full of accounts of Vicente solving land disputes. 

He was also fortunate to reconnect with another Danao cousin (and another World War II guerrilla), Alejandro Almendras, who was appointed the provincial governor of Davao by President Elpidio Quirino (Davao was then still a special province, and its officials were presidential appointees). 

Almendras’ close patronage ties with Quirino led to the appointment of Vicente as provincial secretary, and then, in 1958, when Almendras was elected to the Senate, Vicente took over as governor. Vicente would hold that position until President Ferdinand Marcos appointed him Secretary of General Services in 1964 (again replacing Almendras who was elected to the Senate). 

The Almendras-Duterte clan remained the unchallenged power of Davao City and Davao province. They would only step down from the pedestal when Marcos declared martial law and gradually promoted his own Davao cronies (the Floirendos). Vicente remained loyal to Marcos, but his wife, Soledad, turned oppositionist (and one of the first Davao Dilawan!) after Ninoy Aquino’s assassination in 1983.

It was around the late 1960s and throughout martial law that the young Digong turned from family black sheep to Vicente’s understudy. He finally graduated from college, took up law, and passed the bar. Upon his return to Davao, he was appointed city prosecutor, a position he held until Marcos fell from power. When Soledad refused the offer of President Cory Aquino (the Grand Lady Dilawan) to be officer-in-charge of Davao City in 1986, she recommended her son instead. The rest is history.

This short tour of Digong’s lineage shows how much he was a creature of the political clan and how, after he consolidated his power as mayor, replicated what his family – in fact, what other political families – did: ensure that the children inherit the post and ensure the clan’s monopoly of local power. 

Even Duterte’s populism is not unique. It was prototypical of Philippine local politics. What Duterte has done is nationalize this local “way of doing politics,” with its associated coercive features, vulgar argot, and a more personalized patronage system. Anyone who grew up with local politicos would know how this system worked: lots of macho braggadocio, where charismatic bosses show how tough they are by drinking mixed-brews of gin, beer, rum, and tuba to impress astonished voters; where cursing is part of the stock of trade in all miting de avances; where one proudly counted ones’ mistresses (a strong woman, however, does not talk about her sex life); and where one issues fistfight or gun-duel challenges to opponents.

What Digong has done is to bring this local world into the open. Suddenly, the provincial boss is now the national boss. He is a strongman, but his foundations remain to be the clan. And this explains why, one year into his presidency, he has not gone after any of the established political clans of the country, despite his and his subalterns’ claims that he is “para sa bayan (patriotic).” For how can one kill one’s own? – Rappler.com 

Patricio N. Abinales is an OFW. He is a professor of Asian Studies at the University of Hawaii-Manoa. He wrote the book Making Mindanao: Cotabato and Davao in the Formation of the Philippine Nation-State (Ateneo, 2000).  

Few phrases pack a load as heavy and as serious as the one used as a theme title for a forum I have just attended: Saving the democratic institutions. It carries the whole burden of freedom, social justice, nationalism, and populism and the rule of the majority – why, it carries the whole burden of democracy itself! Now, how does one even begin to imagine what effort might be required to save all that?

The more basic and practical questions, I think, are these: What democratic institutions are we really talking about? Did these institutions get erected at all? It seems to me that they have been in fact defying construction; that they have been coming apart even before they could be put together, coming undone before they could get done. In other words, it seems we simply haven't done a good job of it at all; haven’t even begun to reform our still widely feudal culture in order that freedom and equality may take root and flourish in it.

Meanwhile, Rodrigo Duterte, the messiah of deliverance by extrajudicial shortcuts, has happened to us, overtaken us. By force of authoritarian character, he has co-opted or cowed or otherwise neutralized the forces capable of holding him in check – the very forces that, properly nurtured, would have developed into democratic institutions.

Duterte commands a ridiculous majority in Congress. He has a virtually absolute domination of the House of Representatives and an equally firm hold on the Senate. Some of his senators do switch sides on certain issues at certain times, but only for show; they do so only when switching doesn’t really make a difference in the vote, yet the occasion offers an opportunity for them to give an impression of some semblance of independent-mindedness.

The Supreme Court, for its part, betrays a leaning toward him in recent politically relevant decisions. Two are particularly noteworthy: one has acquitted former president Gloria Arroyo of plunder, the other has allowed a hero’s burial for dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

Arroyo had the good fortune to serve as president for 10 years, stepping up from vice president to succeed an impeached predecessor and serving the remaining 4 years of his term, then getting herself elected to the presidency on her own. Her unusually long reign allowed her to fill the Supreme Court with enough justices to compose a majority she could count on when the time came for her to face the court as an accused herself.

Duterte’s own good fortune lies in his political alliance with Arroyo, now a member of the House. And the Court’s decision to effectively declare Marcos a hero must have given Duterte a sense of validation in his professed idolatry of Marcos as well as in his anointment of Marcos’ son as his own heir.

Beyond narcissism

The cases of Arroyo and the Marcoses are themselves proof that no democratic institutions exist. Otherwise, Arroyo would not have been able to keep the presidency on a rigged vote even after that crime had been established by a taped conversation between her and an election commissioner – didn’t she, in fact, offer an apology on national television? An apology that was all it took for the nation to forgive her for subverting its own vote! 

As for the Marcoses, they would not have been able to return unbothered a mere 6 years after they had been shooed off to foreign exile, get back into the social and political swing of things, and even bury their patriarch a hero.

To be sure, recent times have seen certain groups outside the government lead and inspire a mass rising by street vigil that, by sheer force of numbers and moral ascendancy, works as a potent counterforce. The Catholic Church and the cause-oriented groups that form what we now refer to as civil society made up its core.

But, its own vulnerabilities (money corruption, sexual transgressions) publicly exploited by Duterte, the Church has become timid, thus unable to provide the moral leadership and reinforcement civil society expects from it. Civil society seems in fact to have retreated from the streets and into cyberspace, operating mostly individually, but even there it is drowned out by the unrestrained savagery of Duterte’s hordes of nameless and faceless assassins.

A catalyst force in past freedom and rights fights, the traditional news media themselves are now divided into the intimidated, the charmed, and the overcautiously critical. It would be consoling hope that, thus divided, they cancel out one another’s potency; but, with Duterte’s social media troops in cyberspace, the battle for civility is lost to perversity and the battle for truth to fakery.

Surely, Duterte’s confidence does not come only from his narcissism. He knows that no democratic institutions can stop him; he knows that none of them exist. He knew it when he practically surrendered our territorial waters in the South China Sea to China. He knew it when he let his police loose on drug dealers and users in what now, with thousands dead, appears an indiscriminate and brutal campaign. He knew it when he sent his army to Marawi and his airmen up in the sky to drop bombs on that little provincial city. He knew it when he declared martial law for all of Mindanao upon his arbitrary determination that he was up against not just Abu Sayyaf outlaws and rebel renegades, but also ISIS terrorists.

And doubtless he knows it when he threatens he might just put the whole country under martial law.

Save the democratic institutions? If there’s anyone who needs saving – and needs saving now – it’s us, and if there’s anyone who can save us it’s us, not any of our democratic institutions. – Rappler.com

Eight years ago, a text message from my cousin changed my life forever. 

It still haunts me every time I recall everything that happened that day.

It was a gloomy Wednesday afternoon. I couldn’t move, I could barely speak, and tears welled up in my eyes as I read the message. Everything momentarily stopped. I hurriedly packed up my things and skipped my remaining classes.

When I arrived home, emotions were heavier. I saw my Nanay on the couch as my aunt tried to comfort her. On the other side, my 4-year-old sister sobbed as she screamed, “Tatay, wake up.” My relatives surrounded a white coffin placed at our living area with lights, flowers, and candles beside it. I came closer to you and tears started to fall. I asked God, "Why has this happened so early?"

That moment was a nightmare.

Eight years ago still feels like yesterday. I could still picture you in my mind. A bubbly father who would tease his children when things got tough. A father who would make sure that everything we needed was ready before we asked for it. A father who would think of us before himself. A father who was selfless.

You were the coolest and humblest person I knew. I remember one time when we teased you that we would call you "Daddy" instead of "Tatay". You were pissed off. You took this joke seriously and reminded us that we were not rich because you believed the term ‘Daddy’ was just for the upper class. Despite that, you did everything to make ends meet and provided things that would make us happy.

Life goes on as they say

Tatay, I want you to know we are okay now. However, there were times that I wish you were with us, especially as we celebrated milestones in life. But I know you’re intently watching over us every step of the way, guiding us and making sure that we are in good hands.

Don’t worry. We fulfilled your dreams for us. Your dream for Kim to be an engineer came true! And I graduated from UP like what you wanted for me back then.

I am now working in a news organization. You always told me to chase my passion. This has always been my dream, and you knew that. Please continue guiding me as I go on with this journey. 

NJ is in senior high school while Angel is in the 9th grade. Both of them are doing pretty well in school. NJ represented his school in different baseball competitions. I think he is following in your footsteps. He is your biggest fan. I remember you always brought him with you to watch baseball games, and asked him to accompany you wherever you went. He misses you a lot. 

Angel is very “kikay” now. Well, you knew she would be since then. She won't leave home without anything on her face, and takes her time in choosing what to wear. She joined pageants in her school. Her boy classmates started to notice her and some are courting her now. I assure you her kuyas are closely watching her and will not let anyone hurt your princess.

Don’t worry about Nanay. She is happy now though we know that part of her is still longing for a husband. We are doing everything to put a glow on her face again but I know she would be happier if you were still with us. She deserves a pat on the back, Tatay. She managed to send us all to school despite financial difficulties back then. 

My strongest critic yet my biggest fan

You were the best Tatay, I must say. You never pressured me to be an honor student, but I think the only way I could think of to pay back your sacrifices was by giving you good grades, so I did. I hope this makes you proud. 

You were my greatest motivator. Whenever I felt like quitting, you were there to cheer me up and lift my spirits. 

One thing I can't forget was when I represented my school in an essay writing competition. I placed second. I was excited to come home and share the news with the family and when I told you this, you said, “Son, second place is the first loser.”

I nearly cried that time because I thought you were not happy with what I achieved. Days passed and I learned that you proudly told your colleagues about this achievement, and some of them congratulated me when they visited us. 

Tatay, sorry for the decisions I made on a whim which I knew would upset you. This is the phase of my life in which I need your guidance even more. I don’t want to disappoint you again just because I don’t think of the repercussions of every decision I make. I hope you will not stop guiding me up there.

If I could turn back time

If I only knew you would leave us early, I would have enjoyed and spent a lot more time with you. I would have said I love you many times when you were still here. I should have lessened my kakulitan and not disobeyed you. I know it’s not too late; we still have Nanay with whom we can share our love and make everything up to you. 

As the world celebrates Father’s Day, it may sound cliche, but let me tell you that you’re the best father on earth. You may not be physically with us anymore but you will be forever in our hearts. 

How I wish there was an internet connection there in heaven so that you could read everything I wrote here. Social media is once again flooded with lengthy appreciation posts about their father, and I will not let this day pass without me sharing mine.

Happy Father’s Day, Tatay! I love you to the moon and back. I’m forever grateful. Thank you for everything. – Rappler.com