Peasant
Federation Capacities for AR
PALAMBU
sustained its initiatives towards federation strengthening with COM
facilitating a series of two workshops on assessment and planning of
MAPALAD, one of its more prominent members.
Through this process, an
evaluation of how the peasant organization can build on its internal
strengths and continue to mobilize support from AR advocates was
translated into specific long-term and short-term goals.
Peace
as a Lumad Agenda
An
Indigenous People's Forum, PANAGTAGBO,
sought the support of COM in its initiatives towards coming
up with an IP Agenda for Peace through its provision of process
inputs on the design, resource accessing, implementation and
evaluation of their major project dubbed "Mindanao Indigenous
People's Peace Forum" held in December.
From
Conflict to Community
Development
Of
the MNLF organizations which attended last year's
CO-CD Orientation, the Southern Palawan State Revolutionary
Committee, under the leadership of Chairman Fhardi Adjimin,
signified their intention to seriously employ CO-CD processes
in their community peacebuilding efforts. Thus,
through the support of the Multi-Donor Assistance Program,
twenty of their peace and development volunteers in the municipality
of Bataraza underwent hands-on training on Community Profiling from
July 10-14 and October 6-19 in
six barangays. This
culminated in a discussion on Sustainable Integrated Area
Development (SIAD) as a development strategy which the SPSRC has
decided to pursue in its continuing pursuit of peace.
Promoting
CO-CD as a Strategy for
Building a Culture of Peace
As
its distinctive contribution to the peacebuilding efforts in
Mindanao, the CO Multiversity pursued a dialogical process in which
the Peace and Development Advocates (PDAs), formed through the
support of the UNDP, were engaged in thorough discussions as well as
on-the-ground experiential training on the principles, methodology
and step-by-step process of community organizing.
Cotabato
City was the venue of the Roundtable Discussion on CO-CD and
Conflict Resolution held on March 21-22 as a follow-up process
to refine the content of the CO-CD Manual developed in 1999.
Perspectives from the three key disciplines of history,
anthropology and CO were brought into the discussion with the
presence of Mindanao scholars and development practitioners
together with the Chairpersons of four State Revolutionary
Committees of the
MNLF. A
framework on community organizing as a strategy for
peacebuilding resulted from the discussion.
The participants also recommended the conduct of a CO
trainors' training which
would invite participants from the major ethnic groups to
surface significant cultural nuances which influence CO work.
From
June 26-30, fifteen (15) PDAs
from all over Mindanao and Southern Palawan explored CO
principles and practice from a deep culture perspective during
the CO Trainors' Training held in Davao City.
The outputs from the training eventually became the basis
of the on-the-job training program design which was developed
for the CO CapaBuild Program on Peace-Based CO in the Context of
Tri-people Communities which started in November 2000.
With
these series of discourse and training activities on CO-CD among
the PDAs as strategic partners, the groundwork for a more
intensive and area-based training for four (4)
COs in Brgy. Chua, Sultan Kudarat was thus laid.
The interest and commitment which had been generated as a
result of these processes has facilitated the formation of a CO
training infrastructure which involved the Chairperson and key
officers of the State Revolutionary Committee
of the selected area in Central Kutawato, consultants
from the NGO and academe and the trainers from CO Multiversity.
Towards
a Mindanawon Consciousness: Creating a Critical Mass through
Educational Strategies
CO
Multiversity joined other groups in broader initiatives to
create a critical consciousness on Mindanao as it forged
institutional linkage with the Multi-Donor United Nations
Development Program in a series of roundtable discussions.
As
co-convenor of the first discussion entitled "Insighting
Mindanao: Analysis, Agenda and Advocacy"
held immediately after People Power II on February
5-6, 2001, it
played a key role in the design, mobilization of
participants and facilitation of the sessions.
With the coming into office of COM Executive Director
Dinky Soliman, who also played a key role in the
mobilizations of People Power II, the participants were
given fresh insights by Ms. Fides Bagasao into the
reconfigured forces in government and their potential impact
on Mindanao development.
A significant output of the discussion was a
statement which outlined the policy advocacy issues as well
as the educational strategies that could be pursued in
developing a Mindanawon consciousness.
The
second discussion dubbed "Mindanawon, Paminawon,
Intawon" held on March 29-30, 2001 in Davao City again
saw the active role of COM in a collaborative effort to
bring together government and civil society on possible
areas of engagement in Mindanao peace and development.
Subsequent follow-up activities were identified in
the areas of concept-building and module development for the
evolution of a unifying consciousness among the tri-people
living harmoniously in "shared territory".