A friend, Prof. Miriam Coronel-Ferrer or Iye, is the only female of the four 2023 Ramon Magsaysay awardees for her peace-building contributions. This year marks the 65th anniversary of the so-called Nobel Prize of Asia.
Iye, whom I first met in 2005, is a Political Science Professor at the University of the Philippines (UP), where she has also served as the Director of the UP Third World Studies Centre, and Convener of the Program on Peace, Democratization, and Human Rights under the UP Center for Integrative and Development Studies.
In 2015, she was the Chief Negotiator of the Government of the Philippines (GPH) in talks with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) for the Mindanao peace process.
Prof. Iye, helped us, while I was still a program coordinator for the Social Action Center of the Apostolic Vicariate of San Jose, coordinating the documentation and facilitation of a series of dialogues between the Mangyan leaders and Army Officers operating at that time here in Occidental Mindoro. We escorted Ms. Ferrer to visit the far-flung IC/ICCs and military camps for interviews to develop a Peace Manifesto between the Mangyan leaders, elders, and the Philippine Army Officers. It was in her capacity as the main convenor of the Sulong Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law or Sulong CARHRIHL Network.
Finally, in 2005, a Covenant Between the 203rd Brigade of the Philippine Army and the Pantribung Samahan sa Kanlurang Mindoro was signed by 203rd Brigade Commander Col. Fernando Mesa and PASAKAMI Chairman Juanito Lumawig. It was held at the Chancery Building of the St. Joseph Seminary in San Jose.
The Covenant was an offshoot of a bloody incident we call the Talayob Massacre where the entire Mangyan family was fired upon by army soldiers from the 16th Infantry Battalion of the Armed Forces of the Philippines last July 21, 2003, in So. Talayob, Brgy. Nicolas, Magsaysay, Occidental Mindoro. The victims who died from the indiscriminate firing were Roger Blanco who expired on the way to the hospital, his wife Oliva, who was then eight months pregnant, and their two sons John Kevin, 3, and Dexter, 2.
This tragic incident opened the fortunate partnership between PASAKAMI/AVSJ and the Sulong CARHRIHL Partner organizations in Manila where Mangyan leaders are always invited to various conferences on peace-building and other human rights-related activities and events in the national capital.
The Sulong CARHRIHL Network was instrumental in facilitating the drafting of the National Action Plan on the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace, and Security that was subsequently adopted by the Philippine Government in 2010.
To my knowledge, even now, PASAKAMI is still a member of the network (now Sulong PEACE), where our IPs contribute to peace-building and constantly share their indigenous ways of peace-making on the center stage, so to speak.
I believe that Prof. Iye has an instinctual understanding that injustice is not an ally to peacebuilders.
This is what I learned from her: Peacebuilders are everywhere, and anyone can be one. Regardless of our differences. Regardless of gender.
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(Photo:
Philippine Daily Inquirer)
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