Uprooting the Causes of Mindanao Conflict thru Cooperativism
Prior to ending my six-year term as Chairman of the Cooperative Development Authority (CDA) in 2021, it was so amazing to have been invited by the honorable Member of the Bangsamoro Authority Parliament (MP) Abdullah Macapaar known as “Commander Bravo” of the MILF Northwest Mindanao Command based in Kora-Kora, Munai, Lanao del Norte. Prior to his appointment as MP, Commander Bravo was the Brigadier General of the MILF with some 150 division Commanders comprising some 15,000 combatants. I have to travel to the hinterland of the Bangsamoro Region to meet them as it was so astonishing to know that they have decided to stop their armed struggle but instead to harness their collective potentials through cooperativism. In that meeting, I and some of my staff, responded to their request to be organized as cooperatives based on their vision of peace following CDA’s mission of “Transformative Cooperatives for People, Planet, Prosperity and Peace.” Thus, for two weeks, the 15,000 former combatants underwent Pre-Membership Education Seminars, and after complying with all the requirements, some 115 MILF Cooperatives from the Northeastern Mindanao Front were formed. And I, with all excitement, announced their new identity, not anymore as MILF but would remain as a liberation front, this time, against the number one enemy which is abject poverty and social injustice!
Hearing that announcement, they were so happy and in one voice they shouted, “Allah’u’Akbar! MGA PAGARI AKON, SAMA-SAMA NA TANU KOOPERATIBA. ISA LANG ANG AMING ARMAS NGAYON AT YAN AY KOOPERATIBA!” Indeed, so amazing! Don’t you know that the Mindanao War is the second longest war in the world? Not even the imperial powers during the colonial period were able to totally conquer Mindanao as the Muslim brave combatants waged struggles against imperial colonial rule, be it against Spaniards or Americans. There is no grander sight on earth than these brave combatants finally deciding to stop armed struggle by uprooting the causes of war, to achieve peace by harnessing their collective potentials against poverty and social injustices through cooperativism. Indeed, life Is holy and must not be sacrificed through wars, but instead to work together in pursuit of higher spiritual values which is love and service, based on the truism of oneness and inter-connectivity of all beings, be they Christians or Muslims! Our firm salute then to Commander Bravo and all his brave combatants who told me then that they were languishing in extreme poverty despite their ownership of thousands of hectares of land planted with coconut as copra was just being bought then at P5 per kilo. Thus, after having been organized as cooperatives, the government provided them with some thirty million peso-assistance to put up Coconut Processing Plants. Now, they are selling coco-sugar at P300 per kilo which became their liberating force against poverty! Indeed, Allah’u’Akbar! (God is Great!)
From then on, I frequently visited them and wrote a book on their historical struggle entitled, “A Vision Beyond Sight,” with a Preface wrote and signed by then President Rodrigo Roa Duterte. It was from them I learned that sometime in year 2000, the then President Joseph Estrada launched an all-out war against them, even sending some 100,00 AFP combatants with helicopters, and attacking them in intense armed confrontation. Commander Bravo emphatically narrated those near death encounters and it was their firm belief that one’s strong determination to win is their main weapon. Indeed, beware of a warrior with a firm will to win based on love and righteousness of their cause to liberate the oppressed Muslims. Not even a bullet can stop them as Commander Bravo narrated that although his uniform had bullet holes, but only his uniform was hit, not his body. So miraculous, I said.
According to Sun Tsu, to win a war, three imperatives have to be known: (1) Know thy strength; (2) Know the strength of Thy Enemy; and (3) Know the Terrain. Based on such knowledge and tactics which Commander Bravo applied, while they were just 15,000, their firm determination and the terrain were favorable to them as their camp could only be reached through an intense uphill climb.
The same tactics and strategies can be applied against the number one enemy of the country, that is, abject poverty rooted in social injustice which has continued to afflict us such that it has become “second skin to more than a third of our people.” This is reinforced by SWS survey with “15% of household heads reporting that their families had experienced hunger, without anything to eat, at least once in the last three month.”
In waging war against poverty and social injustice, the MILF combatants must know their strength and its very essence as declared in the 1987 Constitution, “The State shall promote cooperativism as instrument of social justice, equity and economic development.” Indeed, by its very nature, cooperativism aims to advance social justice as its number one priority. In Mindanao where the Muslims as well as the Indigenous Peoples are being displaced and impoverished because the powerful oligarchs and foreign corporations transformed their lands into massive plantations.
It is a great social injustice for these oligarchs not to recognized the capital contributions of the 13 million member-consumer-owners (MCOs) of so-called Electric Cooperatives (ECs). Unlike in other countries, the 13 million MCOs in the Philippines are not receiving monthly patronage refund and other benefits such as scholarship for their children and free medication. When CDA attempted to rectify such social wrong, the former Chairman was harassed with attempts to his life.
The age of cooperativism in war-torn Mindanao has indeed come of age. When the marginalized sectors bound themselves together to collectively mobilize their energies and experiences to achieve a common goal, they have sworn to adhere to certain set of principles designed to democratize wealth and power. These are time-tested and universally-accepted cooperative principles and values that have historically proven to be effective in drawing those in the margins into the mainstream of development processes by defining who we are as human beings, created in the image and likeness of God. Indeed, the number capital is not money but the human being whose potentials and inner spiritual values rather than material values should be maximized. Cooperativism has really come of age as high veneration to the profit-motive has already captured the mindset of all governments, all universities, all institutions, the media and religious groups. The power of money is the principal disease of our time, rooted in flawed structures and the blindness of egotism. The call of the times now is to maximize spiritual values, not short-term profit or consumer goods. Indeed, who truly we are, we must be known on the principle of what we live-by and not on how much fame, power and wealth we have.
Even as we know our strength, we should know the forces that make the people poor. The World Bank Study stating that poverty is caused not by the lack of resources but is rooted in the powerlessness of the people gives us an idea on how to attack poverty. If the problem is the powerlessness of the people to benefit from the fruits of development, then the remedial measure is empowerment, which of course calls for people to seek redress by binding themselves together through cooperativism.
For these former brave MILF combatants now organized into cooperatives, they are now in the forefront of combating poverty and social injustices for peace in Mindanao. The words of the late Gen. Douglas McArthur speak well of them: “Old soldiers never die, they just fade away.” To these gallant former MILF combatants led then by Commander Bravo, our firm salute and warm embrace as you advance the essence of Transformative Cooperatives for People, Planet, Prosperity and Peace – all for God’s greater glory! ALLAH’U’AKBAR!
