Remembering Impalutao

Impalutao is one of those places that remind me of particular "strips" of good memories. It is a barangay along the national highway in the municipality of Impasug-ong, between Kisolon and the City of Malaybalay in Bukidnon.

I was reminded about quiet Impalutao, around 15 kilometers from downtown Malaybalay, this week over the so-called peoples' initiative for charter change. In a barangay assembly, relatives reported, some local politicians alligned with President Arroro, allegedly campaigned aggressively for people to join a signature drive for "cha-cha".

Anyway, I'll tell the story of a beautiful place and not the gory nation-wide signature campaign.

Three of my father's brothers live in Impalutao and wed into the rich culture of the Higa-onon indigenous peoples starting in the 1960s. Though the families of their wives came from agriculture-rich clans, many of them live very simple lives. Theirs was a life that is rural and discrete.

But as vacationing young children in mid-1980s, we did not feel deprived. Instead, we felt the abundance of nature in Impalutao. I had fond memories of this place during my childhood.

Then, we would go into the nearby forest reserve, a portion of which is visible from the highway. At times, my brother and sisters join our cousins in traversing the wilds of Impalutao. We were a bunch of adventure-seeking kids whose aim was to find the way to either Gantungan or Dila Falls. The falls of Impalutao are renowned oases during summer in Malaybalay.

Once there, we would race in diving to the very cold natural pools. Truly, those were ice-cold experiences for the falls are within the well-kept Impalutao watershed. During those summer picnic days, we would bring packed foods: boiled Saba bananas, "ginamos"  and roasted fish.

We would abuse the waters by swimming wildly and playing games like water polo using an improvised ball made from coiled coconut leaves.

Fun would last until late in the afternoon when one of our parents would "rescue us" from our childish frailties. Usually, the eldest of the brood would get his ears pinched for being the rascal leader.

On special occasions, we would go home to a dinner of wild pig or native chicken and simple Higa-onon food. I could recall asking where they got their cold water when they do not have power for a refrigerator. Drinking water is so clear and cold.

Our summer nights were filled with storytelling from one of our uncles who at a time imposed on us his kind of "fairy tales": adventurism in a faraway place and his exploits with young women when he was still, as he claimed,  the barrio's most sought after bachelor.

Songs from my father's relatives or from their lumad kin would soon lullaby us. We try hard to sleep, very conscious that next to the house is a forest full of unknown creatures who make all kinds of sounds.

Those were nights of discoveries too and forest who's who. As the small kerosene lamp, or "lamparilya", is put off ––we settle to sleep.

I remember looking forward to the following day's share of fresh cow's milk from a ranch nearby or a plastic cup of native coffee served while everbody shivers in the cold mountainside morning.

Everytime I pass by that portion of Bukidnon's Sayre Highway these days, en route to Cagayan de Oro from Malaybalay, I would flash a wide smile.

Now, things have changed a bit. Further into the highway, I could see the balding mountainside and the increasing population of Impalutao. I could still see the forest reserve though.

I wonder if the kids still go to Dila or Gantungan Falls or if these cold havens still exist? I really hope so. Around us is a world where everything is a work in progress or destruction.  Hoping, yes I am. I will rely in the wisdom of peoples' words and in nature's own rhythm.  

Adventures in Impalutao's gifts of nature will remain in my memory for a long time. I just wish that when its my turn to tell children about it —it's still there. They too can go there.

On explosions in Jolo, Sulu and Digos, Davao del Sur

Blogpost Views By Walter I. Balane

If anything, the two reported cases of explosions in Digos, Davao del Sur and in Jolo, Sulu this week (http://www.mindanews.com/2006/03/29nws-digos.htm and http://www.mindanews.com/2006/03/27nws-sulu.htm ) present a recurring type of
Mindanao.That, it is a place where bombs explode for whatever reasons.Of course it is not true and there are worst tragedies elsewhere.

Extortion was blamed for the two separate incidents. Someone informed Fatmawati Salapuddin, a resident of Sulu and lead convener of the Mindanao PeaceWeavers, that it has something to do with extortion. This is the same bell rung by the police in the Digos bus explosion. Salapuddin expressed fears that the Jolo incident is part of “scenario-building that would justify a full-blown war in Mindanao that will start in the province of Sulu.”I won’t fault that paranoia. It's about Mindanao's history repeating. There are so many wounds in Mindanao that needs healing.

But, maybe too, its just as it is– a "fear". It is also not a pleasant news for journalists, though it is newsworthy. Others might say, "pera na naman to" (Its money, again). Personally, I wouldn't be happy going to another coverage on violence.

The lives of those people are more important than the piece of story I could file about them at the end of the day. But that is also the same reason why even with this resentment journalists need to report on the incidents.  

To tell the world what exactly happened, according to a multitude of sources and across time.

Certainly, not any reason could justify damage and violence. More so if it impacts not only to the direct victims but through its externalities in the on-going processes on peace in Mindanao and even on perceptions towards Mindanao and its peoples.

This shouldn't stem to war or any more violence. Hopefully, all sectors and parties to this incident would realize their responsibility: that they are stakeholders in Mindanao's peace and future. By now, all systems must go for peace. It's high time for Mindanao to claim its collective victories. Otherwise, there will be no end to conflicts, poverty and despair here.

They will remain as disturbing facets of a past that revisits us often, too often. 

ESSAY: A student of Mindanao

DAVAO CITY – “There is no difference between living and learning . . . it is impossible and misleading and harmful to think of themas being separate,” writes John Holt, in his landmark book on alternative education “What Do I Do Monday?”

I’ll take a dose of Holt as I reflect about how I feel about choosing to stay and work in Mindanao.

I live and I am enrolled to a Mindanao that is an open university where the lessons are boundless and the teachers are not limited to PhD and master’s degree holders. And there goes something about living here that I wouldn’t change for anything.

For Holt, home study is an alternative to school-based learning systems. Learning in Mindanao could be my “home study” as Mindanao is home to me and I share as

a collective domain the plains, rivers, streets, highways, structures, forests and public places with other Mindanawons.

I write in the context of informal, continuous and personal learning experiences and I do not propose that students shun the schools and stay home, instead.

Living in Mindanao this time is such a privilege. I think that Mindanao’s complexities, diversities and circumstances are conducive learning realms.

My anthropologist friends and journalist colleagues share to me from time to time theories, their experiences and views. Sometimes they theorize or complicate

things for me, or simplify it and connect the pieces.

All the time, they did it with passion, grace and wit.

In the receiving end, I could only thank them for I had become a beneficiary of their scholarships and worthwhile field works.

Many of these theories could be read in Mindanao’s libraries such as in the Mindanawon Initiatives for Cultural Dialogue at the Ateneo. Through library work, I also benefit from the bodies of work of various scholars who wrote on Mindanao across time.

I am not a post-graduate student. I believe that from listening and interacting with the

“conferences” of peoples, ideas, histories and futures in everyday Mindanao I learn enough for my present needs. Besides, my open “campus” provides me with much

wider, boundless and real-time learning opportunities.

Foremost of these are the forum sessions held to consolidate and thresh out some pressing issues on Mindanao, the country or the world.

In the Kusog Mindanaw conference in November 2005, I paid full attention to Rudy Rodil, the GRP peace panel vice chair, as he gave updates of the peace process.

I know that Ompong, a historian, was telling history to Mindanao’s various non-government organizations and groups who are part of Kusog.

Apart from him, there were a handful of presenters in that conference. In two days, I had a virtual tour around Mindanao and on the peace process, traversing timelines and spaces listening to the discussions.

Fora around Mindanao offer pregnant discussions on issues like the peace process, mining in Mindanao, organic farming, development aid to Mindanao, tourism

prospects for Mindanao, federalism and many others. Sometimes extensive or intensive, the discussions end with a consensus or a resolution to “agree to disagree”. I took advantage of these dynamics to understand Mindanao deeper.

I have also met different leaders of Mindanao’s various organizations from the civil-society, non-government sector, local government units and corporate world. Count in the contrast: from the leaders of the Mindanao Business Council to the leaders of jeepney drivers’ associations and leaders of Mindanao’s ethnic groups like the Matigsalug tribal

council and even mining executives or their disciples.

When these people meet, they bring with them oftentimes conflicting views and stands. I find listening to them argue and contra-pose each other a healthy and worthwhile chance to learn.

The peace process between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front is an example. For me, it is a running “case study”. Peace is Mindanao’s top agenda

and the positive outlook on a final peace agreement is a welcome news. How this process is done, who is doing it and not doing it, what issues are they talking about, what issues are slowing the process and what prospects do we have are important for today’s young

people in Mindanao, like me. I look at these moves as crucial to Mindanao’s future, and mine too.

I was able to share about what are “ancestral domain” issues the peace panels will talk about, to a Mandaya farmer who attended MindaNews’ grassroots journalism

in Caraga, Davao Oriental in December 2005. Thanks to the Kusog conference. In return, he explained to me how important it is for them to safeguard their lands

from intruders like logging firms. He said land is life for them. The way he explained it to me, with deep concern and emotions, moved me.

Mindanao looks back in history and peeps at the future as indigenous peoples other than the Bangsamoro neighbors take a hard look at ancestral domain. For the past five years, the government has sped up distribution of Certificates of Ancestral Domain Titles (CADTs) but ancestral domain and indigenous governance has remained as major aspirations among Mindanao’s IPs. Aside from these discussions in gatherings around

Mindanao, opportunities to work with communities also provide extensive and intensive learning interactions.

The communities are open fields of learning. A healthy exchange of experiences, knowledge and world views can stem from engagements worked on prior agreed and

mutually beneficial arrangements with communities.

I have experienced learning from simple people from various communities in Mindanao. They all have their own way of doing things and sometimes, their ways were

better than mine. In fact, many of them are scholars in their own right and are very reliable researchers and sources for they are “in the field” themselves. Most of the time, my trips and encounters with these peoples and communities are far better than reading

about them in outdated books.

Mindanao ‘s communities yearn for empowerment and we can draw energy and encouragement from them. In Upi, Maguindanao, the internet, thanks to a local

government initiative, pulls the world closer to the locals. But some of the Tedurays and the Iranun residents still cling to age old traditions that have remained useful, such as some of their community communication systems.

I realized that the communities around Mindanao are living archives of rich traditions, histories and possibilities. As an outsider, I think I have a stake on keeping those treasures intact and helping enhance the same with the locals.

The communities are not only spaces for rehabilitation, as in those conflict-torn areas, but

are also fountains of lessons and stories for others to hear. But I don’t think communities should be viewed only as milking cows of information.

Through continuous, mutually-beneficial and comprehensive experiences with communities, I think I have become a quintessential student who goes to the

field to gather and validate what I have learned.

Yes, I am a student. And I pay homage to my campus –the vast fields

of Mindanao. (Walter Balane/MindaNews)

COMMENTARY: Trying to revisit Malaybalay’s past

By Walter I. Balane / MindaNews / 16 June 2004

MALAYBALAY CITY — On the 15th of June, 127 years ago, Malaybalay was established by the Spanish conquerors as a town or “pueblo.” After years of resistance, local inhabitants, led by Datu Mampaalong, bowed to the Castillan army led by 1Lt. Don Felipe Martinez.

Mampaalong, now the name of a lonely street in the city’s poblacion, was among the respected leaders of Malaybalay’s earlier residents. Malaybalay’s inhabitants, according to accounts, allegedly came from the “seashores of Northern Mindanao”. According to a copy of the deed of the pueblo’s creation, which MindaNews found at the city library, Mampaalong and 30 other datus “submitted themselves to the sovereignty of the Nation (Spanish crown)” on June 15, 1877.

As recorded, some of the datus named in the deed in Spanish were Datto Manpalon (Mampaalong) who was baptized as Mariano Melendez; Sugola; Mindaguin; Apang; and Bansag. They allegedly took their oath to the Spanish crown on behalf of the estimated population of 453 then. (Malaybalay’s population in 2004 is estimated at 137,579).

For lack of additional records on the oath-taking, one cannot tell if the datus fought first before paying allegiance to the conquerors. Or could they have given their oaths “freely?” If the existing records of Malaybalay’s history are to be the basis, the datus and their ancestors resisted Spanish conquest.

In fact, according to another “brief history” of Malaybalay at the city library, the “last recorded resistance by the inhabitants against the conquering Castillan army” was “sometime in 1850.” The inhabitants resisted foreign aggression, that’s certain. According to a city history reader, at the height of the Spanish conquest of the hinterlands of Mindanao, the Spaniards burned the entire village of what is now known as Kalasungay, now at the northwest part of the city.

All adult male residents in the settlement, it said, were killed while the women and children were taken hostage. At the time, Bukidnon only had five settlements namely, Malaybalay, Sumilao, Linabo (now in Malaybalay), Mailag (now in Valencia) and Silae (Malaybalay). There were no details written about the exploits of the survivors other than the information that those who survived and fled to Silae (a very remote barangay now) slowly returned a few years later and settled near Sacub river (now the site of the Plaza Rizal) under the protection of Datu Mampaalong. Sacub river is now known as Sawaga river.

On the day Mampaalong and the 30 datus took their oath of allegiance to the Spanish, they accordingly embraced Christianity. Since then, June 15, 1877 has been referred to as the foundation day of Malaybalay. But it is interesting to note this entry of Malaybalay’s very limited “written” history. In fact, it was probably taken from pages of Spanish chronicles about their “God, gold and glory” conquest.

The deed I quoted above was from a government document written in Spanish translated by a local government clerk in the 1970s. Now, the document is just a sheet of bond paper fastened together with the “brief history” of Bukidnon’s other localities. If indeed true, the accounts were from the point of view of a conqueror vanquishing his enemies. In fact, so much of 19th century Malaybalay is taken from accounts based on Spanish chronicles.

If there is any written history from other sources, they are not found in Bukidnon’s public libraries and therefore not made available for the public to appreciate. I have yet to see a history of Malaybalay written from the point of view of the Lumads. If today’s generation of Malaybalay residents do not have a clear view of Malaybalay’s history, then it won’t appear significant if June 15 is being celebrated as the town’s foundation day, never mind if it was not a day worth celebrating for their ancestors. But one significant fact remains: unlike in other Spanish settlements around Mindanao, despite the pueblo’s being named as “Oroquieta del Interior,” the name Malaybalay, accordingly a Castillan slip in the pronounciation of “walaybalay,” is still the name of Bukidnon’s capital. The celebration of Malaybalay’s foundation day is actually a celebration of the inhabitants “submission” to the Spanish crown; the creation of the “pueblo” being just a “consuelo de bobo”.

The deed goes: “…His excellency the Governor General, Don Domingo Moriones Y Murillo, who actually represents His Majesty in these Islands; he was accepting the submission tendered by the above named magnates (31 datus) for themselves and in the form and under the conditions offered; promising them [the inhabitants] to the protection and assistance necessary against their enemies, such as the maintenance of peace and order, as long as they remain loyal and faithful to their oath, and to commemorate their oath of allegiance, he is declaring the establishment of the town under the name Oroquita, to which the subject[sic] agrees.

The use of the words “submission” and “subject” indicate the conditions of the datus at that time. . Apparently, the use of June 15 to celebrate Malaybalay’s foundation day is a big mockery of its indigenous ancestry; showing submission rather than courage and zealousness. Although I can imagine the datus celebrating with the Spaniards after the creation of the pueblo, I can guess they would have wanted something better if only they had the choice. Certainly, the day wasn’t really a day of jubilation. I could only guess it was a day of defeat. Marking the foundation day on June 15, 1877 would only give credit to the Spanish conquest more than the resistance. No one can change the past.

But of course, understanding the past could very well be a good guide to understanding the present and charting the future. My argument does not intend to look down on Datu ampaalong and the other tribal leaders for their submission to the Spaniards. Certainly, there were merits in the “submission” owing to the organization of the “pueblo.” But what
I am trying to point out is, which part of their struggle, if any for a concept of “a people,” is being “honored” in the celebration? Is it the part when they stood against aggression or when they surrendered to aggression? Adding salt to injury, the city held a joint celebration of Philippine Independence Day and 127th Foundation Day on June 12 at the city’s Freedom Park.

According to reliable sources at the city government, the coincidence was unintentional for it has been a tradition for Malaybalay to mark its foundation day on the nearest Saturday to June 15. But there lies the irony in this year’s joint “celebration.”

Independence Day celebrated together with the commemoration of the day the local datus “submitted” and subjected themselves to the Spaniards? If Malaybalay’s youth had been taught about their history, they would probably have been confused.

Watching the joint “celebration” at Freedom Park last Saturday, I heard local officials calling on the people to be thankful for not only the big blessings but also for the small ones. In times when the “people are at the mercy of societal problems, we should be thankful that we are free,” Mayor Florencio Flores told the crowd composed mostly of government officials and employees.

For sure, the people of Malaybalay are better off without a foundation day celebration that’s founded on defeat. But, they would never know. Malaybalay’s history is not even well stocked in its libraries.

(MindaViews is the opinion section of MindaNews. Walter I. Balane reports on Bukidnon for MindaNews).

ASEAN News: Visit our country, Burmese general tells critics

Visit our country, Burmese general tells critics
By Walter I. Balane /MindaNews / 20 January 2006

DAVAO CITY – Branding as “baseless accusations” criticisms against their country’s human rights record, lead delegates from the government and private sectors of Myanmar (Burma) asked critics to go to the junta-ruled Southeast Asian state and see for themselves the real situation.“To see is to believe,” the Burmese delegates who attended the ASEAN Tourism Forum here told journalists in two press conferences held for the occasion.

“See for yourself the beauty of our country and our people,” said Brig. Gen. Aye Myint Kyu, Myanmar’s vice minister for hotels and tourism ministry.

Kyu, while saying his country is willing to host the ATF in the future, had been mum, however, over the media’s clamor for explanation why Burma backed out from hosting ATF 2006.

Burma’s withdrawal as host forced Davao to take over with only six months left for the preparation.

ATF 2005 host Malaysia had been reported to have blocked Burma’s hosting of the event this year for political and other reasons.

Malaysia has pushed for Burma to allow a United Nations representative to visit the country.

Kyu, Myanmar’s highest ranking official at the annual event, told MindaNews that like any other country there are political dynamics in Burma but that it is “safe to go there”.

U Khin Zaw, chair of Myanmar’s Travel Association, said in a separate press conference Wednesday that Burma’s officials were busy attending an “internal and unavoidable circumstance”.

He cited that the months prior to the ATF coincided with their national convention.

The national convention is Myanmar’s military rulers’ way of consolidating opposing political parties.

Zaw and another official presented to the media the beautiful tourist attractions of Myanmar but the latter’s questions dealt mostly with the country’s political situation.

“We have no much ado. We invite you to visit our country for you to see it for yourself,” he said.

The Initiatives for International Dialogue, which led protest actions calling Myanmar “Asean’s Shame” is accepting the challenge.

In a press statement, Gus Miclat, IID executive director and regional coordinator of the Asia Pacific Solidarity Coalition, said: “We accept the challenge to visit Burma. The Myanmar junta should know the region’s (ASEAN) civil society have [sic] been wanting to visit but have not been allowed inside if they have not been blacklisted.”

Miclat said they will wait for their official invitation, “but the junta should first grant a visa to former President Corazon Aquino”.

Aquino had intended to visit Burma’s pro-democracy leader and Nobel Prize winner Aung San Syu Kyi, who has been put under house arrest.

Also, IID asked to allow the return of the United Nation’s representative to Burma. The junta, officially known as the State Peace and Development Council, banned the UN representative from the country by indefinite postponement.

IID further asked Myanmar to allow the Asean delegation headed by Foreign Minister Syed Hamid to visit in consonance with the agreement at the Asean summit in December 2005 in Kuala Lumpur and to allow the IID a visit to Syu Kyi and other political prisoners as well as the various impoverished ethnic states.

IID pointed out that some visiting members of civil society were arrested, imprisoned and sentenced to five years in Rangoon, Burma’s capital, “after they attempted to see for themselves the situation inside.”

The statement enumerated several indicators of Burma’s state abuses including the continuous detention of Aung San Syu Kyi and other political prisoners, the absence of the UN representative in Burma, the series of attrition against ethnic nationalities while their own bogus national convention is ongoing, the forced labor issues, the employment of child soldiers, the absence of free media and the systematic rape cases by the military in Burma.

Several UN agencies and other impartial watchdogs of international crimes have documented these incidents.

According to IID, the abuses speak well of the junta’s callousness even to diplomatic pleas by their own neighbors to consider basic reforms.

“If indeed the military regime of Burma is not hiding any skeleton inside their closet, why then did they skip their turn in hosting the prestigious ATF? Are they afraid that delegates may discover a cabinet not only stacked with skeletons, but one that is also full of maggots?” the IID asked.

In recent years, the Asean has shifted from an earlier policy of non-intervention to a soft approach to the Burma issue, calling on it to reform immediately.

The Philippine government discussed the issue of Burma at the UN Security Council when it became a non-permanent member last year.

Kaamulan 2006 opens in Bukidnon

Kaamulan 2006 opens in Bukidnon
By Walter Idul Balane / MindaNews / 22 February 2006 MALAYBALAY CITY – This year’s Kaamulan festival opened here with a promise of new and better activities for tourists and local revelers, said Elsie Gail C. Ocaya, Bukidnon provincial tourism consultant.

The provincial government did a soft opening of the
month long celebration on February 12 but the “grand
opening” will be held on March 3.

An early morning  traditional Bukidnon ritual called
Panalawahig will be officiated by datus (tribal
leaders) at the Kaamulan grounds. A Catholic mass
would be celebrated at the Capitol grounds. After the
rituals, major sponsors of the event would go around
the city on a motorcade.

The Kaamulan festival is the province’s major tourist
attraction with ethnic street dancing competitions on
March 4 as the highlight.

Ocaya told MindaNews about new activities in Kaamulan
2006 that give more value to the cultural aspect of
the celebration, not only tourism.

She said this is to help increase the public’s
appreciation of the cultural heritage of Bukidnon’s
seven tribal groups in addition to the street dancing,
bazaars, sports tournaments, rodeo shows, nightly
musical, dance and entertainment shows among others.

Ocaya said for the first time there will be an
indigenous song writing clinic for students and the
general public. She said Bukidnon-based Talaandig
artist and musician Waway Saway agreed to lead the
“open to the public” clinic. Saway, based on the
official schedule provided to MindaNews, would also
have a concert on March 8.

The 1st National Folklore Conference will also be held
here on March 2-3 and is part of the official schedule
of Kaamulan 2006.

Ocaya also cited the re-entry of Bansagen, an exhibit
of Bukidnon contemporary art by a group of local
artists from March 1-10. The exhibit, on its 5th this
year was not in last year’s celebration.

She also stressed that this year’s ethnic sports
competitions would occupy center stage and could be
seen and participated by more people on March 6.

Another new event in this year's festival is the
Bukidnon Kaamulan 21-kilometer open marathon
competition from Valencia City to Malaybalay City on
March 9.

Kaamulan is also a haven of trade fairs showcasing
Bukidnon’s cutflower, livestock, agri-food industries
and the major industries operating in this
agriculture-based economy.

In the last three years, Bukidnon’s hotels and inns
declared  full occupancy during the Kaamulan
celebration with domestic and foreign guests.

Bukidnon is home to the Bukidnon, Higaonon, Talaandig,
Manobo, Matigsalug, Tigwahanon and Omayamnon tribes.
Majority of its present population (at least 1.06
million in 2000) is composed of settlers and lumads
who have inter-married with migrants from Luzon and
the Visayas.

In 1977, Kaamulan started as a local celebration of
the cultural heritage of Bukidnon’s lumads (indigenous
peoples) held annually in September. Starting 1996, it
is held from the second half of February to March 10,
the anniversary date of the foundation of Bukidnon as
a province in 1917.

“Kaamulan” came from the Binukid (dialect spoken by
most of the lumads) term “amol-amol” or gathering for
any purpose, which could mean a datuship ritual, a
wedding ceremony, a thanksgiving feast during harvest
time, a peace pact or all these altogether.

The provincial government of Bukidnon and the
Department of Tourism have promoted the festival as a
tourist attraction. With mileage in the national
media, more tourists visit Bukidnon for the Kaamulan
in the last five years.

Revelers from around Bukidnon and tourists from around
the country come to watch the annual ethnic street
dancing competition among local institutions and
recently, from Bukidnon’s 22 local government units.

Kaamulan is now among the Philippines’ major festivals
and the only “ethnic festival” in the country,
according to the DOT. Based on their 2005 estimates,
at least 100,000 visitors arrived for the festival
last year.

The provincial tourism office admitted in 2004 that
the festival is Bukidnon’s only tourism promotion
initiative. Ocaya said the provincial government
allotted P3 million in holding Kaamulan 2006 with
private corporations taking care of some attractions
as major sponsors.

In 2004, critics claimed the festival doesn’t really
make lumads better off because its commercialized set
up aims to boost tourism only and not the real welfare
of Bukidnon’s indigenous peoples. They said the
provincial government should come up with a genuine
development program for the indigenous peoples in the
province.

In 2005, Bukidnon Governor Jose Zubiri said they have
taken steps to alleviate the plight of the lumads.
Zubiri said 20 percent of the province’s annual budget
is given to the lumads in the form of medicine and
food needs.

Ocaya told MindaNews last week that they are taking
measures to ensure handlers of the festival’s
activities like the street dancing observe cultural
sensitivity and no lumad would be exploited in the
celebration.

Ocaya said Kaamulan is fast becoming Bukidnon’s entry
point to the country’s tourism industry and may also
usher tourists to Bukidnon’s less popular but also
interesting tourist attractions (http://www.bukidnon.gov.ph/indextourism.htm).

Life won’t be the same without the eyes and ears of journalists

Life won’t be the same without the eyes and ears of journalists
Walter I. Balane / Mindanews / 18 November 2004

DAVAO CITY — The speeches at the indignation rally held Wednesday at the Rizal Park here made Manong Racky, 36, understand the fate of journalists.Aside from hearing some of them through his favorite local radio station and watching national television news, he has not actually met a journalist in person.

Racky loves TV news personalities better.

“I like it when I could see the eyes of the one who makes me informed,” he told MindaNews as the rally went on.

Speaker after speaker expressed messages of grief, rage, hatred, courage, hope, love and faith. Manong Racky stepped closer to the sidewalk across the street so he could listen.

He works as a utility worker of a local printing press. While waiting for a jeepney back to his work, MindaNews approached him for an interview. At first he declined but later on agreed.

“I am glad they are speaking in Bisaya so it would be easier for me to understand the issue,” he said.

As a media fan, he loves to see his favorite radio announcers speak on stage. He said most of his free time is spent on TV and radio and news program are his favorites. He confessed of voting for most of the candidates from the media who ran in the 2004 elections.

But aside from his first time to see journalists in flesh, Wednesday’s indignation rally was also Racky’s closest encounter on the issue of journalists being killed.

“I thought they are just powerful. I could hear and see them to be very loud and brave people,” he said.

“Now I understand that like us, ordinary people, journalists also cry, grieve. They also die,” Manong Racky said.

The National Union of Journalists in the Philippines (NUJP) has reported 59 journalists killed since 1986, 10 of them this year.

According to an NUJP leaflet, it was only in 1994 and 1995 when no journalist was reported killed in the country. Of the 59, 25 were from the print media and 34 from broadcast (TV and radio).

Twenty eight of those killed were from Mindanao.

MindaNews’ photo editor Gene Boyd Lumawag, 26, is the most recent victim in Mindanao. He is the fifth from Davao City, based on the NUJP list.

If not mistaken, NUJP’s Carlos Conde revealed that Lumawag is yet the 2nd photojournalist slain since 1986.

Manong Racky admits of having not heard about Lumawag. He said he does not read newspapers.

“But he must be important or his death is really serious because the emcee said there are reporters from other parts of Mindanao who came here,” he said.

“He must be famous because you are all here, sir!,” he said.

Manong Racky listened to the speeches at the stage. Between speakers, he asked some questions about how much journalists earn, among other things.

He expressed disbelief when told about the average monthly salary of a full time reporter at P5,000 to­ 7,000.

“It is just like how much I earn, yet my job is a lot easier,” he said.

Unlike Manong Racky who spent time listening to the speeches, Oscar, 26, who works as a security guard for a shop nearby, has no interest at all.

“Sorry, sir wala ko kabalo kung nag-unsa na sila dinha,” he said.(I’m sorry sir, I do not know what they are doing.)

Just working across the Rizal Park stage, Oscar chose to chat with co-workers. “I really do not know about the killings.”

Jenalyn Caga, 17, a student told MindaNews the rally is about the “death of a journalist.”

“I hope the killing would end because I pity the journalists and their families,” she said as Tyron Lumawag, the youngest brother of Gene Boyd spoke at the rally.

Caga, a commerce student, however did not want to become a journalist if given a choice.

“I feel that it is a dangerous job,” she explained.

Manong Cocoy, 53, a sidewalk vendor is even more perplexed.

“Nganong mag rally-rally man na sila diha, patay naman kaha nang reporter? Mabuhi pa ba diay na? (Why are they holding a rally? I though that journalist is already dead? Can they resurrect him?)

Manong Cocoy, however, agreed that journalists are important in the community.

“If I have the money I would allow my son to take B.S. Reporting in college, if he wants to,” he said.

Manong Cocoy said he would allow his children to pursue careers in journalism even with the reports of killings.

“In whatever job you are in, if it’s your time already, you will have to go,” he said.

“My greater problem is that I don’t have enough money to send my children to school and take any course at all,” he added.

Carlos Conde, NUJP’s national secretary-general, said it is important for the “common tao” to understand the fate of journalists because they are working for the people.

“The people must be able to value the importance of press freedom because it would be for their own good,” he said.

Conde said the “culture of impunity” spawned by the killing of journalists is working against press freedom and at the same time against the people’s civil liberties.

He said not any of the 59 cases of slain journalists has been solved.

Conde said the government must pursue investigations and implement existing laws against the killings.

Manong Racky said he knows the pain journalists are encountering.

“Someone in the family, although not a journalist, also died. But we want journalists alive. I hope journalists would go on reporting. Life won’t be the same without the eyes and ears of journalists,” he said.

"I hope there is a way to stop these killings," he added.

Mindanao forum: Phase out synthetic agri inputs in RP by 2015

Mindanao forum: Phase out synthetic agri inputs in RP by 2015
By Walter I. Balane/MindaNews / 14 December 2005DAVAO CITY — Around 200 Mindanawons from different sectors sought a total phaseout of synthetic commercial inputs in any farming systems in the country by 2015 and also a ban on field releases of all genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in food and agriculture.

They signed this on a covenant Tuesday at the end of the "Go Organic Mindanao" forum on safe food and food security.

“Thus, we encourage men and women farmers to produce natural inputs (and their creativity be respected) leading to the total phaseout in 10 years.”

The group also included in their action agenda that "even logging, monocrop plantation expansion, mining and other resource-extractive activities should be done away with such that in its stead will flourish sustainable organic agriculture initiatives that contribute to farmer health and economic well-being."

The forum, a sequel to an earlier conference in Manila on December 9-10, gathered Mindanao's farmers, religious, civil society groups, members of the academe, students, government officials and personnel, and private individuals from different provinces of Mindanao.

The Coalition for GMO-free Mindanao, a broad coalition of NGOs around Mindanao, including Food Sovereignty Watch, convened the forum in cooperation with the Malaysia-based Third World Network. The discussions were focused on promoting sustainable organic agriculture as an emerging and viable alternative to genetically engineered farm inputs and chemical-based farming.

They also expressed support to the mandatory labeling of products of genetic engineering technologies in respect to the rights of consumers to information and choice. At the moment, synthetic products like genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are not labeled as such in the open market.

They expressed preference for sustainable organic agriculture using natural inputs as well as for the diversification in farming system. “We believe in the inherent capacity of men and women farmers to develop, conserve and utilize plant and animal genetic resources that sustain and enhance biodiversity and food security,” they said.

The group also called for the implementation of the precautionary principle in dealing with synthetic technology. Also, the immediate ratification by the Senate of the Cartagena Protocol, a protective instrument against the damaging effects of genetic engineering (GE) and GMOs, already signed by 120 countries in 2003.

The group aimed to make bio-safety regulations strict, stringent, transparent and linked to sustainable agriculture and other considerations.

Around 11 “principles of unity” were adopted in the covenant. The other principles expressed the group's preferences for holistic health and the belief in the security of tenure of men and women farmers to their land as crucial in local livelihoods and food security.

The participants affirmed that sustainable organic agriculture is critical in promoting farmers’ empowerment. They said that farmers “must have political voice and capacity to stand up against corporate agriculture, whose operations are becoming a regular part of day-to-day reality in Mindanao.”

Sustainable organic agriculture, they said, is the only viable emerging alternative to the unrelenting advance of commercial plantations in key provinces in Mindanao. They added that the main impact of which is to further push the farmers and their families to more deprivation and poverty.

The group demanded for transparency and farmers’ participation as the government decides on its agricultural programs. According to them, such are focused on a package of technologies like hybrids and GM crops, and high-value commercial crops “often at the expense of the environment and long-term benefits of farmers and farming communities all over the country.”

But as the group believes that there must be a balance between development and environmental protection, they expressed that there are bigger socio-political economic forces that will affect the balance.

Responding to international expert Dr. Mae Wan Ho, who spoke about “the need to re-structure Mindanao's food system” earlier at the forum, the participants expressed in the covenant that “local production should be prioritized for local consumption.”

Mindanao has become a haven for high value commercial commodity export crops with the spread of banana, pineapple and other mono-crop plantations.

After the government approved the release of GMOs in the country in 2003, the anti-GMO movement has “changed strategy.” Engr. Roberto Verzola, sustainable agriculture campaigner from the Philippine Greens, told participants on Monday that promoting sustainable organic agriculture is the new strategy in campaigning against GMOs.

“The promotion of sustainable organic agriculture is a positive step towards attaining environmental sustainability,” the covenant states.

According to the organizers, the forum was organized to revitalize debates on GE (genetic engineering) and at the same time strengthen and promote organic agriculture as an alternative to GE.

In February 2006, the international Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) will ratify a recommendation from a technical group on whether to lift a ban on “Terminator technology” or GURTS (genetic use restriction technology), which will render hybrid seeds sterile after harvest.

Such technology was considered by farmers in the forum as unfair, selfish and serves only the interests of hybrid seed companies.

Reflections on a Singapore stopover

By Walter Balane/MindaNews / 01 October 2005

SINGAPORE – Changi Airport, one of the world's busiest airports, was surprisingly lonely when we arrived here on Wednesday. I found it a bit eerie as I sat on a bench recollecting my thoughts. I was made fully aware that I am a stranger here, listening to announcements of flights made in scores of unfamiliar languages. 

I am in Singapore for a few hours on my way to Thailand. I don't know exactly what's in store for me in this trip yet, but I think I am comfortable with the fact that I'm traveling to South East Asia. I will visit a news agency from Shan State in Burma, whose editor, came to Mindanao almost around two months ago as an intern on newsroom management at MindaNews.

The idea of a trip to Burma attracted me. Burma, before I knew about the military junta that rules it, is to me a place of mystique and beauty. Even if the only image I had as a high school student about the country is that of an elephant carrying logs, Burma has remained a country I wanted to visit.

Of course I can't go to Burma this time, and for someone who has his own memories of a dictatorial regime and its atrocities, there might be no space for me there. But thanks to the South East Asian Press Alliance, MindaNews is taking part in a program designed to help some journalists from some states in Burma who are exiled in Thailand. I will meet them in Chiang Mai.

SEAPA asked me and another journalist from Iloilo to help the interns consolidate what they have learned from their internship in the Philippines. We shall work with SEAPA to design a training program that suits the needs of these journalists. Also, we were asked to serve as guest editors of two news agencies based in Northern Thailand. What a task. For these news agencies are primarily edited in Burmese and in the Shan language, Burma's second largest ethnic group. Only three to five people are working in each news agency and among them only one or two could speak and understand English. But this is exciting, at least for the fact that we are asked to help train journalists struggling hard amidst political suppression in Burma. Anyway, in Singapore, I realized eventually that there might be no need for me to feel like a stranger. I am in a big city that has been one of the homes of the Malay race, through which we Filipinos draw our ancestry. As a descendant of the Malay race, a hesitant Asian and a journalist from Mindanao, I think I have a right to be at home here.

In between raised eyebrows at the sight of noisy Japanese businessmen and tall Caucasian tourists in the terminal, I thought of my own identity and my own space on that bench.

Do I harbor pride of my own country in this particular situation? In fact, if I have more time I would have wanted to stay longer and cover the trial of a Filipina maid accused of killing a compatriot in this city. When I told my sister about this trip, she asked me to try to contact a neighbor who works as a maid in a district in Singapore. I could meet up with her to say hello or carry some "padalas".

But I really pity the image of Filipinos as maids here, although I don't fault those working there for that. I read the Straits Times to divert my attention and to see for myself if the Philippines exists in this economic scale, at least one day in one newspaper. Before I could do that though, a Philippine Airlines flight from Singapore to Jakarta was announced. At least, there is me and that flight in that aloof airport. I have proven, Yes, I exist here, at least in Changi.

The Straits Times showed a view of South East Asia, our immediate neighborhood. Its front page on September 28 carried stories from Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand. I also read news from or about the Philippines, particularly one about a Tagaytay City meeting of ASEAN ministers. Why would the Singapore paper post such stories on its front page? Doesn't it have its own issues? Aside from the paper's positioning as a regional paper, I think Singapore is also a regional business center and it has proximity, geographical or otherwise with Malaysia, Indonesia and even Thailand.

I can understand the lesser prominence given to stories about the Philippines. Yes, we are insular. Our newspapers front pages are filled with our own mess and our affairs with the American government. Our borders with our neighbors are with deep and wide seas. Besides, are we Asians in more ways than one? In travel magazines too of major Asian carriers, exposure of Philippine destinations like Davao and Cebu pale in comparison to those of other ASEAN countries, minus Vietnam, Laos, Burma and Cambodia.

I think I am made fully aware that we are practically lagging behind our neighbors, one thing that I already knew about elsewhere. Add to that their image of the political situation here and the quality of governance. At least, the Filipina contestant to the Miss International pageant in Japan bagged the crown that night and it was also in the Straits issue. Even that isn't really a source of pride, only a relief maybe.

Right where I was sitting, in a corner at the large Changi airport, I weighed my insecurities versus. my pride as a Filipino about to partake in an Asian exchange, for journalism at least.

In silence, I resolved that I shall not weigh my trip's worth against that of those who went ahead of me nor to that of my country's lagging pace and sorry image. I shall take the liberty to prove my own worth, to work with humility and competence with counterparts, and from what I learned here, to be ready to chart a path that I can take and pursue.

Meanwhile, I'll try to enjoy bonding with our distant neighbors. Help me convince myself that I am not a stranger here, really.

Hain ang mga Mindanawon nga ‘hero’?

PAMALANDONG:
Hain ang mga Mindanawon nga ‘hero’?
ni Walter I. Balane/MindaNews / 27 November 2005 

DAKBAYAN SA DABAW — ­ Gipangutana ko sa usa ka bisita gikan sa nasud nga Thailand kung taga Bukidnon ba ang national hero nato nga si Dr. Jose Rizal.

Sa among paglibot sa probinsya, namatikdan niya nga matag lungsod dunay gipatindog nga monumento alang kay Rizal isip paghandom sa iyang kaban-og.

Matud pa, usa ka maayong talan-awon og pahinumdom sa katawhan ang mga monumento ni Rizal sa matag lungsod. Apan ang bisita mihangyo nga ipakita usab nako sa iya ang plaza o monumento man lang sa mga ‘bayani’ nga gikan gyud sa Bukidnon.

Intawon, gipaningot ko ug tubag kay wala man diay ko’y ipakita niya. Bisan usa ka istatwa o ‘paghinumdum’ na lang walay napatindog sa mga parke sa Bukidnon alang sa mga bayaning lokal. Duna ba?

Netbag (Netibo o lumad) man, Bisdak (Bisayang Dako) o Mindak (Mindanawong Dako), wala may nailhan nga ‘hero’ nga taga-Bukidnon nga gipatindugan og rebulto bisan usa lang kadangaw ang hitas-on.

Sama gihapon ang iyang pangutana sa dihang misuroy siya sa ubang dapit sa Mindanao. Nahibuwong daw siya nganong nanginahanglan pa kita ug inspirasyon gikan sa mga hero didto sa Luzon. Wala ba kitay "sariling ato?"

Kinsa man ang mga bayani nato? Duna batay mga ‘hero’ nga Mindanawon? Kontrabida ba sila sa panan-aw nato?

Sa Cotabato City, nagpahulagway gyud ko sa atobangan sa monumento ni Sultan Kudarat niadtong higayon nga una ko’ng nakabisita didto. Nasayod ko nga talag-saon lang ang maong rebulto dinhi sa Mindanao. Usa pa, dili pa kaayo ilado kining mga taw-hana isip mga ‘hero’ labi na sa mga kabatan-onan, sama nako.

Sigurado ko nga daghang mga lungsod ug dakbayan sa Mindanao nga mabaw pa ang kamat-ngonanan sa hisgutanan mahitungod sa istorya sa kagahapon (history). Apil na niini ang pagtando sa mga ‘hero’ o mga taong nakahatag ug dakong tabang sa paghulma sa unsa ang Mindanao karon.

Motungaw kini bisan sa paggamit sa mga termino. Wala koy madali-dali ug gamit nga termino sa akong paghisgut sa usa ka ‘hero’. Sa mga Tagalog sa Luzon si Rizal usa ka 'bayani. Duna bay terminong Bisaya, Maranao o Binukid sa “hero”?

Maayo pa ang mga taga Cebu kay si Lapu-lapu ilaha pang gitukoran, moabot na gani ang iyang rebulto didto sa Luneta, kung nadayon man.

Hinuon daghang mga tao nga ilado sa matag probinsiya sa Mindanao nga gi handuman ug dungog paagi sa mga dalan nga gi-ngalan kanila.

Apan ang mga pangalan sa dalan daw wala naman siguroy bili labi na sa mga kabatan-onan nga wala na makaila ning mga tawhana.

Sa Malaybalay, Bukidnon duna’y dalan nga ginganlan og “Datu Mampaalong Street” isip pagpasidungog kang Datu Mampaalong, lider sa mga taga-Bukidnon niadtong panahon sa pag abot sa Espanya.

Apan ang dalan karon haskang mingawa. Akong gipangutana ang mga estudyante sa high school didto kung nakaila ba sila anang “Datu Mampaalong.”

“Pangalan mana sa usa ka dalan diri. Wala ka ba diay makahibalo? Tubag pa nila didto sa usa ka panagtigum.

Pastilan! Palayo! Mas nailhan ra diay nga ngalan sa dalan si Datu Mampaalong dili isip usa ka 'hero' sa mga taga-Bukidnon niadto.

Usa ba kini ka tima-ilhan nga nalimtan na ang atong mga katiguwangan ug ang kagahapon? Ang pagtukod ba sa mga monumento dili na uso o para lang sa mga taga-Luzon?

Wala man siguro’y dautan sa pagpatindog nianang mga monumento para sa mga ‘hero’ gikan sa laing dapit. Angayan lang pud nga dunay monumento ni Andres Bonifacio og ang uban pa natong mga tinahud nga mga 'hero'.

Pero mayo pa si David, dunay dako nga monumento diri sa baybay sa Dabaw. Nindot baya paminawon nga usa diay kining dakbayan sa pipila lang sa tibu-ok kalibutan nga dunay gipatin-dog nga replica sa istatuwa ni David. Garbo kini dili ba?

Apan hain man pud ang para sa gikan sa Mindanao?

Naa siguro diha nga mga pipila ka monumento alang sa mga lokal nga 'hero' sa mga dapit nga wala pa nako naadto-an. Pero, kung dili man galing putol na ang ulo basin gilumutan na ni kay wala na naatiman.

Kung dili kitang mga taga Mindanao ang mohinumdum sa atong kagahapon pinaagi sa pag pasidungog sa atong mga lokal nga mga ‘hero’,kinsa man?

Ang mga taga-Batanes? Ang mga taga Aceh, Indonesia?

Naksiguro ko nga daghang mga istorya mahitungod sa mga local nga ‘hero’ sa tagsa-tagsa ka mga banay, tribu, lungsod, dakbayan, isla o probinsiya dinhi sa Mindanao. Apan nagahinay-hinay na sila og kawala sa adlaw-adlaw nga pagdala sa mga hisgutanan dinhi sa Mindanao.

Maayo pa ang tribu sa mga mananap sama sa kabaw, bisan tuod nga paborito silang sabawon sa daghang lugar diri sa Mindanao, duna pay mga istatuwa gipatindog alang kanila.

Kung wala ko masayop, dunay monumento sa kabaw diha sa Gap Farm sa Ma-a ug sa highway didto pud sa Toril. Sa Bukidnon, inig sulod palang nimo sa boundary diha samay Alae, na’ay istatuwa sa kabaw nga imong makit-an kung gikan ka sa Cagayan de Oro. Naa pa siya’y kalo sa cowboy.

Maayo pang mga kabaw nahinumduman. Naunsa naman ni? Nakatung-tung lang gani ug kabaw, nagkinabaw na.

Discovery trip to Cotabato City

FROM BUKIDNON TO THE WORLD: Discovery trip to Cotabato City
(Published in MindaNews on 05 June 2005)

COTABATO CITY – “Success! Finally, I have been to Cotabato City”.
I entered that on my diary for June 4, 2005.

Pardon my petty revelation. I used to consider a visit to "Kota Wato" as a far-fetched possibility. Maybe because, aside from limited resources, I “became” afraid of the city’s reputation as a place of crime, violence and conflict, as portrayed in news reports.

Peace is the issue and the unresolved conflicts in Mindanao publicized in negative light help sow fear and repulsion.

But yesterday’s trip to the seat of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao showed many things to me. Truly, travel is educational. For a place that is not among people’s dream destinations, a visit to Cotabato could really be boring.  But, aside from Marawi, this is the other Philippine city I wanted to discover. And, that’s beyond question.

My companions in the trip, all from MindaNews, labeled it as a “simple joy” vis-à-vis Gigi’s trip around Mindanao.

For me, it's really a petty achievement compared to Jocan’s earning a masters degree in anthropology. I even shamelessly documented my feat: I posed in front of the old Cotabato City Hall and with the monument of Sultan Kudarat in the park across the city hall. I wanted to tell my friends I have finally been to Cotabato City. The photos would be my proof and the experience a statement of my conquest.

I did not escape my colleagues’ jeers, though. Imagine yourself posing in the park while park goers marvel as you smile. I did not really mind.

I wouldn’t have done that if I went to Butuan, Vigan or Tacloban — I have not been to those places, too. But a trip to Cotabato, Marawi or even Jolo, Sulu would strike me as an opportunity to deal with my ignorance, my fears and my perceptions.

I am really curious about how it feels to live in areas like Cotabato where conflicts happen. But I am not a wide-eyed wanderer, a war journalist or a sight-hungry tourist. I am just a resident of Mindanao who wants to learn more about the island and its people. I am even afraid to call myself a Mindanawon in view of my ignorance. Even with a map, I still wasn’t sure if Cotabato has beaches or if is it a landlocked city.

In Bukidnon, where I grew up and in Iloilo where I studied, the view about Cotabato City or other cities proximate to the conflict areas in Mindanao is aloof. When I told my friends years ago that I was planning to attend a classmate’s wedding in Cotabato City, I was told to scrap it. A young professionals’ group, of which I am a member, also did not hold an annual event in the city a year ago for security reasons. In Manila, most of the people who have not been to Mindanao would view it like the media does: a land of fear, disorder and uncertainty.

But while there is an unresolved conflict in Mindanao, I don’t believe it is the one that sows fear, disorder and uncertainty. In Cotabato City, I found out that people there live just like the way I do. They also eat the same "bulalo" I am fond of except that they cook and serve it better.

As I was listening to Chairman Ebrahim Murad, of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, I have more reasons to believe peace is in order. Our interview with him at the MILF Peace Panel Office in Barangay Darapanan, Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao yesterday also helped change the way I look at the Mindanao conflict. How? As I listened to Chairman Murad, I began to understand more about the MILF’s struggle. I began to deal with my ignorance.

Here is Murad, the face behind many peoples’ fears and perceptions towards the Bangsamoro talking about peace and development in Mindanao. Surely, peace in the South is a work in progress and no longer a remote possibility. I think it is ignorance which sows fear, repulsion, hatred and disorder.

My ignorance is an indication of the extent of my being aloof to Cotabato City, the Mindanao conflict and the struggle of the Bangsamoro people or even casualties of wars including the bakwits (evacuees).

It is reducing this ignorance, I think, that helps me not become a part of the conflict. I am hoping that my “simple joy” or my curiosity becomes my ticket in discovering Mindanao’s wide avenues of history and culture.

I am humbled by the realization that I have traveled to more cities in the Visayas and in Luzon than in Mindanao. It’s a shame for someone who wants to work for peace in Mindanao. It’s a shame for someone who wants to help correct the misconceptions about the situation in Mindanao and the circumstances that its people figure in.

I want to help spread efforts that help people understand the Mindanao situation, by trying to understand it myself. For me, it’s simply a matter of choice. If I decide to understand the Mindanao conflict, then I am working to help achieve peace in Mindanao. If I decide to linger in my ignorance, then I am working for the opposite of peace.

Yes, my visit to Cotabato City was just a simple feat. But I am taking it as a significant step in my little role as a Mindanawon in the crossroads of charting how I could help Mindanao in my own way and how to make that as my way of life (Walter I. Balane/ MindaNews).

From Bukidnon to the World

From Bukidnon to the world
By Walter I. Balane/MindaNews

MALAYBALAY CITY — Since I started reading newspapers on a daily basis in 1994, I had always wanted to read news datelined from my home province. Having studied and worked in Iloilo and Manila, I always considered reading news from home as my way to be connected on a social perspective.

The publication of news from home in national dailies is of course also a source of pride, although, when it is bad news, a source of shame. But “national daily newspapers” did not really give me news about Bukidnon. I considered myself left out among my friends from other cities in the country.

Almost on a daily basis, there was news datelined from their places. And almost everyday, I tended to forget about “caring to know what’s happening back home.” This is why I have my own resentments towards the “national press.” It is as if my province or myself did not exist. I got an impression that everything was all right in Bukidnon, just as the news or the lack of it, has indicated.

The feeling made me think that I was becoming a “second class citizen.” The geographical persecution I got from acquaintances in Manila and Iloilo also added salt to injury. Every time we talked about hometowns, they always teased me about the “mountains” and the backwardness of Bukidnon.

For them, Bukidnon is a faraway place. They would say I have grasped the value of “modern” clothing and speaking the lingua franca unlike my kababayans back home. For them, people in Bukidnon wore "bahag" and lived in the mountains as the provincial name connotes.

Worst, while they thought of the people of the province as mountain people, they also believed of the whole province as a big farmland, half of it planted to pineapples and sugarcane. Even when I checked the internet for information about Bukidnon, the results were insufficient. Only government portals have postings on information about the province, mostly basic guide for tourists.

I always ended conversations on a note of disgust. I believed nothing wrong was going on, except that I was talking to geographically and socially ignorant urbanites. Deep within, I doubted. With the absence of news and information, I had my own ignorance about Bukidnon my home. I began to believe that, indeed, nothing was going on.

I began to feel that Bukidnon was, indeed, “backward” and “provincial” to be written about in newspapers. I was totally wrong of course. When I went home in 2001, so much had changed about Bukidnon in my around eight years of absence. Many things happened in the province that did not gain prominence enough to land in “prestigious” and “national” daily newspapers.

Apparently, “no news from Bukidnon” meant no one has been covering the province on a dedicated basis. Also, I realized that Bukidnon is not in the national news because it’s not an area of conflicts between government forces and the Moro rebels and the Abu Sayyaf. In short, it’s not where the bad news is. Obviously, the conversion of an agricultural and environmental haven into a bustling economy, complete with degradation, is not news to editors in Manila.

When I became a reporter and eventually editor of Central Mindanao Newswatch, I planned that someday, Bukidnon would be in the news for what it is and people would understand it. It’s not really about the good or bad news, but about what has really happened.

When I joined MindaNews in 2002, I got a full view of how I was going to achieve such vision. MindaNews has provided me with an avenue to put Bukidnon’s peoples, events and issues in the news without really haggling for attention. There are actually many journalists who are now covering Bukidnon for national coverage, but more than half of their reports are about the province’s annual cultural festival.

Bukidnon is of course more than mountains, the Kaamulan festival, the “largest pineapple plantation” or the “second home of sugar centrals.” In MindaNews, I found the perfect vehicle to go and get the message across. The pride that I have for becoming part of MindaNews’ editorial team is one that stems from my desire to help chart the way Bukidnon is reported and the way the peoples, events and issues in the province are understood.

With MindaNews on the web, Bukidnon news is not anymore confined to its provincial boundaries. Last year, when I wrote about the corn cob problem faced by thousands of Bukidnon farmers, a former boss who now works at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) campus browsed the articles I wrote from the web. “Your homecoming is amazing, you are now doing what you have always wanted to do,” he wrote in an e-mail.

He reminded me about my plan to go home and work in the province where I think I was most needed. In another coverage, a Malaysian consultant for the palm oil industry being put up in Bukidnon told me he got his Mindanao 101 from http://www.mindanews.com. Now I see the power of information, especially on Bukidnon, transcending boundaries.

Hopefully, I could help make the world understand our province and the rest of Mindanao. I feel very fulfilled in realizing that my little desires in the past to be updated about Bukidnon news has resulted in my desire to report about Bukidnon and Mindanao, the way it should be. Thanks to MindaNews and the people behind it.

(Walter I. Balane, 27, is a MindaNews correspondent based in Malaybalay City. He used to edit Bukidnon’s only regular newspaper, Central Mindanao Newswatch. A member of the steering committee of the Mindanao Media Forum, Balane has an economics- management degree from UP-Iloilo. He has MBA units at the International Academy of Management and Economics in Makati).