The real enemy

By Carlos Isagani T. Zarate



"IDAAN na lang natin sa kantahan and say no to war," (Let's just express it through music and say no to war) implores the emcee to a large crowd that flocked to Taboan, a complex housing rows of bars inside Davao City's Matina town square during an evening of concert last March 30. A concert for peace that gathered not just local artists-poets, stage performers, musicians, including Apo's Danny Javier and jazz artist Toots Tolentino, but even those who simply admire good music -- be it jazz, reggae, ethnic, rock, R&B, alternative -- and poetry, especially those that talk of peace instead of war. Anti-war songs were interspersed with poetry delivered with gusto by Palanca winner Don Pagusara, particularly criticizing the US-led war in Iraq and its implications on world peace. The concert was organized by the Institute for International Dialogue (IID). It capped a series of activities launched by different groups in the city to condemn the March 4 bombing of the Davao City airport and also to oppose the ongoing war in Mindanao and even in the Middle East.

Last April 1, the IID sponsored another activity for peace at Taboan: it launched in book form the memoirs of peace advocate Fr. Roberto Layson, OMI. Layson, parish priest of Pikit town, North Cotabato province for almost six years now, was the 2002 awardee of the Pax Christi International Peace Prize for his "life-long dedication to creating a culture of peace in local communities." His book details not only his personal experience as "pastor to his flock" but also, and more importantly, the tragic experience of the same internal refugees in Pikit -- Christians, Moros and lumads (indigenous tribes) alike -- who have been victimized by the "constant war" between the armed forces and the MILF since 1997 until recently.

Yet, as the clamor for peace in this part of the country becomes louder, the day after, April 2, a powerful bomb exploded, leaving 16 innocent civilians killed (including children), shattering Davao City's main seaport, and leaving many others injured.

It was the second bomb explosion that rocked the city in a month's time. The ugly face of war and violence again is visibly etched in the collective anguish of the Davao residents.

I shall quote liberally some excerpts from Father Layson's book to get an understanding on the senselessness of war, especially on the lives of innocent civilians:

"Everybody asked me who pulled the trigger first. The military said it was the MILF; the MILF said it was the military.

"As usual, no one claimed responsibility for triggering a war that would, again, displace thousands of civilians. But what I can say, however, is that this war was very well planned given the massive military buildup days before and the troop reinforcements that came from as far as Jolo, Sulu. After five days of intense ground and air assault ... the government raised the Philippine flag in Kabasalan and declared victory. It is true that the government achieved its military objective by running over the Buliok Complex, an enclave of the MILF. But how can the President (Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo) say this is a victory for the government when this military assault just displaced thirty-nine thousand civilians?

"There are two wars going on right now in Pikit. One is a war that is still going on between government troops and MILF forces. Another war is taking place inside 30 evacuation centers. It is a daily war being fought by evacuees fighting for their own survival...

"Is this a victory the government can be proud of? If it truly is, then my heart bleeds because the government has shown that it has no compassion at all for its own people. My heart bleeds as well for the ordinary soldiers and rebels who were forced to wage this war, a war that could have been easily prevented had our political and military leaders not played gods over the destiny of Mindanao."

"Why must our lives be always disrupted by wars? What have we done to deserve this fate? What has the government done to prevent the escalation of violence?" Father Layson lamented.

Recalling the many interim agreements signed by the peace panels of both the government and the MILF since 1997 until May 2002, which, among others, deal with the cessation of hostilities, ceasefire monitoring, relief, rehabilitation and development of communities destroyed by the all-out war, Father Layson claimed that the people in the affected areas "were made to believe that both the government and the MILF were sincere in pursuing the path to peace and have decided to solve their problems in the negotiating table and not in the battlefields. Now, the complete opposite is what we are seeing here in Pikit."

"This war has no basis at all. The peace talks were going on. There is a ceasefire agreement. The mechanisms to avert war are in place... What has gone wrong? We feel deceived and betrayed. This war... shows that both the government and the MILF failed the people. And I hold this government more accountable for the suffering of our civilians because, as a state, it is supposed to have the moral high ground to exhaust all peaceful means to prevent war for the sake of its citizenry..."

"Those who believe that war can be won in the battlefields are living a lie. For in war, there are no victors. In war, the real enemy is war itself."