The Indigenous Peoples (IPs) in Mindanao
will push their agenda to the government and the National Democratic Front
(NDF) peace panels, hopeful that this time, their voices will be heard.
Saying the IPs have been sidelined in peace talks, the Lumad
Mindanaw People’s Federation and the PASAKA Federation of Lumad Organization in
Southern Mindanao wanted a peace agenda and
representation in the peace process.
Among the telling issues from both groups are the
de-militarization of the Indigenous Peoples communities, recognition of right
to self-determination, review of the Certificate of Ancestral Domain Title
(CADT) issuances, cancellation of mining and timber licenses and the
demarcation of 33 Lumad territories.
During the Media Roundtable Discussion on Indigenous Peoples
and the Peace Process on Wednesday at Pinnacle Hotel, Jimid Mansayagan, Lumad
Mindanaw chair governing council, said Lumads have been marginalized ever
since. He lamented that even the learned people look at Lumads as primitive and
backward.
Through the years, Mansayagan said Lumads have been pushed
back into the boondocks. This time, however, they have no safer place to go as
armed conflicts were brought right into their communities.
While they are neither pro-government nor anti-communist
rebels, Mansayagan said Lumad Mindanaw is pushing the total de-militarization
of IP communities and the immediate demarcation of 33 tribes in Mindanao .
Pasaka chair Kerlan Fanagel has called for a stop to the
implementation of the Internal Peace and Security Plan-Oplan Bayanihan and
Peace and Development Outreach Program of the Philippine Army (PA) and renewed
calls for a military pull-out and paramilitary forces.
He said that military operations have caused harassment and
other human rights violations against the Lumads.
Even the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples ((NCIP)
is now into the last of a series of peace dialogues with IPs nationwide to set
reforms and agenda on social and political aspects affecting the IPs.
NCIP Commissioner Dominador Gomez, Ethnographic Commissioner
for Regions 9 and 10, said they already completed peace dialogues with CADT
holders in Luzon and Mindanao . After the
Visayas dialogue, a national conference of around 80 members from Luzon,
Visayas and Mindanao will review the general situation of the IPs that includes
IP representation in national and international bodies, and peace negotiations
to ensure the real issues within the ancestral domain are laid down.
Gomez, who is a member of the Higaonon tribe, highlighted
the importance of reviewing the origin, history, language, economic system
practices, political systems and practices, social system, justice and peace
building processes of the IPs from the start to the present.
GRP peace panel members, lawyers Antonio Arellano and Angela
Librado assured that there will be institutional mechanisms available
especially for sectors vulnerable to armed conflict.
She said JMC would lay down the guidelines to lodge
complaints and how to treat them.
Librado said the plight of Lumads will be included in the
discussion of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Socio-economic Reforms in the
second round of peace negotiations on October 6 to 10 in Oslo , Norway
Arellano said that two members of panel committees from the
GRP side are well-knowledgeable to lumad issues. He said most of the panel
members are human rights lawyers, thus would surely take cognizance of the
plight of the Lumads and look for solutions to their basic problems.
There are also opportunities that Lumad issues will be
discussed and resolved. While there is fragmentation and sharp political
ideological divisions of IPs, Arellano said the proposed Federal form of
government is also open for discussion in the peace talks that could address
political and social divisions.
http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=2&sid=&nid=2&rid=927387
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