Pelayo is Mutya ng Dabaw 2023

By MAYA M. PADILLO

Aftera three-year absence due to the pandemic, a new Mutya ng Dabaw has been crowned.

Maria Isabel Pelayo of Barangay Indangan bested 29 other aspirants during the coronation night held at the University of Southeastern Philippines (USEP) Gymnasium on Friday night.

Joining her court are Joanna Marie B. Franken, Diwa ng Dabaw; Jamyla Diane B. Ampis, Sinag ng Dabaw; Dulce Amor P. Lumictin, Pag-asa ng Dabaw; and Piligrina Jendy B. Bentayao, Patnubay ng Dabaw.

The night was not only belonged to Pelayo, an avid aerial arts practitioner, but also to two of Davao City’s top fashion gurus - Gary Monroferos, an inter- national fashion designer based in Dubai, and fashion Czar Boy Guino-o, a recipient of the Datu Bago award for championing and incorporating in his designs the craftsmanship of the indigenous tribes in Mindanao. Semi-finalists strutted the stage wearing the creations and designs of Monroferos and Guino-o, who are considered icons of Davao fashion

FPELAYO, P6

Delvo back in Davao as new PRO reg’l director

Philippine National Police (PNP) chief General Rodolfo Azurin Jr. has designated a familiar face in Brigadier General Alden Delvo to replace Brigadier Gen Benjamin Silo Jr. as regional director of the Police Regional Office (PRO 11).

Delvo served as city director during the term of former President Rodrigo Duterte.

Silo will now head the Civil Security Group after Azurin implemented reshuffling among high-ranking police officers on Friday.

The PNP chief also named Police Brigadier General Anthony Abellada Aberin as the new Regional Director of the Police

Regional Office (PRO) 7, replacing Police Brigadier General Jerry Fornaleza Bearis.

Bearis also get Aberin’s former position as Director in the PNP Aviation Group.

This is part of the final PNP review wherein 11 high-ranking officials have been given new designations effective on Friday.

Azurin said the police organization’s leadership changes as a routine overhaul. He clarified that the latest does not signify that third-level officers in the PNP, or those with ranks of colonel to general, have been exempted from the ongoing purging.

By Maya M. Padillo

Marawi City – There is a hidden narrative from voiceless human lives in the margins of Philippine society. The stories we hear about Muslim Mindanao are usually Manila-centric. Manila only sees Mindanao from its biased point of view. Social scientists and political commentators have pointed out that the situation in the Philippine South has been largely unstable due to a history of violent armed conflict. The truth of the matter is that colonial history is the root cause of the divide between the minority Muslim Filipinos and the Christian majority.

But what can be learned from the past peace agreement between the government and the Moro National Liberation Front, which was signed in 1996? Former Senator Santanina Rasul believes that its failure meant that “the real measure of peace, and the reason why people are begging for peace, is not the termination of the

Peace And Justice In The Bangsamoro

conflict.” Rather, she says that the reason “people want peace is because they want food on their tables, they want jobs, they want justice, they want shelter and health care, and they want a decent life.”

In my conversations with Dr. Godiva Eviota-Rivera during the Ethics for Nature Conference at the Mindanao State University in Marawi, an initiative led by the school’s young and dynamic philosophy faculty, she mentions the importance of the solidarity among Maranaos and Christians in Marawi City. The same solidarity is crucial in sustaining peace in the Bangsamoro. To buttress this point, the studies of Azuna Yoshizawa point to the value of everyday interaction among Muslims and Christians in Iligan City as a testament to their peaceful co-existence.

The deep-seated structural injustice, which implicates both colonial history and feudal politics in the region, needs a radical transformation by means of interfaith dialogue and authentic democratic participation. The rectification of the historical injustices against Muslim Filipinos is the most important element in the whole peace process. According to Atty. Hamid Barra, the minister for Human Settlements and Development in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), Islam is a religion of peace. Muslim Filipinos, he says, desire holistic peace. An important dimension of this desire is anchored in how people respect and value each other as human beings.

The autonomy to govern given to the Bangsamoro through the Bangsamoro Organic Law is not just about self-determination. It is also meant to heal the wounds caused by our colonial past. Without this moral healing, the whole region will not be able to move forward. Peace is a collective effort. The re-

ANTONIO V. FIGUEROA

A native of California, USA, Edward E. Christensen arrived as a school teacher in the Philippines in 1901. His first station was in Kalibo, Aklan (1901-03) before joining the forestry service for a year. After this, he went home to rest and later pursued his passion for teaching.

In 1913, he returned to the country to assume as manager of the 832-hectare Mindanao Estates Company (MEC), a hemp estate in Padada, Davao del Sur, leased by American planter Brudett Crumb. The farm was then experiencing losses and low production.

Eighty hectares of the farm were tilled with 80,000 hemp hills while over 200 hectares were planted to 22,000 coconut palms

Adjacent to the estate was his own land, the 953-hectare Christensen Plantation Compa-ny, which was exclu- cent peace agreement can be considered as the greatest accomplishment of both Muslim and Christian leaders, a process that was facilitated through the political will of former President Rodrigo Duterte. But above all else, it is what the Bangsamoro people want.

As the BARMM seeks to develop a progressive and inclusive society, political leaders and technocrats cannot limit themselves to a state-centric technical interpretation of past problems. A host of development issues must be addressed – equitable distribution of resources, human security, equal opportunity, and political reform. To truly empower the people in the Bangsamoro, critical questions pertaining to justice and equality must be resolved. Without this democratic resolution, the Bangsamoro will find it hard to pursue the good of its people.

Peace cannot be narrowed down to the question of conflict. Rather, it is about people wanting to live normal and decent lives. Marawi City has witnessed its share of violent extremism in 2017. Maranaos, in solidarity with Christians, have survived the crisis. But to maintain peace, rebuilding efforts must be sustained. The promotion of democratic values cannot be attained without public trust which can only be won by the government through concrete projects and programs. The interpretation of the events in the Bangsamoro, past and present, must carry the reality and struggle for social justice. Undeniably, the concept of solidarity cannot be blind to the moral violence committed against the poor, especially the poor in minority cultures. This violence is nothing but the very objectification of the powerless, where humans are reduced to mere instruments by hegemonic and elitist structures that alienate and dehumanize people. Lasting peace can only be realized if there is justice for all.

EDWARD E. CHRISTENSEN, PADADA PLANTER

sively cultivated by Cebuanos recruited from Cebu and paid P1.10 in the daily minimum wage. Christensen knew the obligation of treating his laborers well, fearful that unfair practices would force them to abandon their jobs and seek employment in nearby plantations.

Many of Christensen’s farmhands, after saving money from their wages, took up 24-hectare homesteads, built modest homes, and brought their families to Padada. Those who fell on hard times for various reasons were forced to work for the homesteaders as peons.

Overall, Christensen managed 1,785 hectares across two extensive abaca estates.

The principal stockholders of MEC included Paul Gulick, a lumberman of Baguio and La-guna; M. L. Miller and David Walstrom, manager and teller of International Banking Corpo-ration (IBC) in Cebu, respectively; U.S. Army Major H. F. Cameron, who was stationed in Philadelphia; and P. C. Round, a former judge of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

On the other hand, Christensen Plantation Company’s shareholders, aside from the ma-jority stockholder, were Gates L. Spalding, a teacher from Kansas who taught in the islands; Federico Aznar, plantation manager of MEC under Christensen’s supervision; and Manuel Aznar, the manager of Christensen’s estate. It has an authorized capital is P100,000.

The American Chamber of Commerce Journal, in its December 1926 issue, explained in detail this pattern of Cebuano migration (‘Hemp, Coconuts and Dividends at Padada’) that helped developed the two plantations:

“[The farmhands] are paid by the day and found, so that the average minimum wage works out about P1.10 and the highest, for field foremen, about P2.00. Hemp is stripped with the Universal hemp machine… The husking of coconuts preparatory to drying the meat into copra is the only labor left to contract. This wage labor is found quite satisfactory; it has been the direct stimulus to very extensive homesteading by Cebuanos in the Padada district.

“The men come to Padada with the prospect of being hired on the plantations. This oc-curs. When they have saved some money and looked up locations, they take up homesteads and bring on their families; and more recently they bring their families with them. Men, who actually file claims, gather around them several kasamas who fall into their debt but open fields on the homesteads and work these fields on the shares. Among four or five men, per-haps one becomes a prospective freeholder; the rest are his peons and he alone has advanced to a better state. He must, however, dispense fairly decent treatment to the men, because the plantations are nearby and they could find work there if they left him.”

After Christensen’s death, his sprawling estate was subject to an intensive legal battle that reached the Supreme Court. For being an American citizen, his will was contested by his heir. Still, the high tribunal, opposed to the lower court’s decision that invoked the internal law of California, ruled to apply the Philippine statute interpreting the inheritance issue.