EDITORIAL - Modest objectives

Like her predecessors, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has chosen the country’s neighbors in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as the venue for her first official trip abroad. Today she leaves for Malaysia, where she will meet with Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and witness the signing of a merger agreement between the Moro National Liberation Front and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. Later this month she will visit Brunei and Singapore.

Another newly installed Southeast Asian head of state will also be tra-veling this month. Indonesia’s new president, Megawati Sukarnoputri, has chosen the Philippines as her first foreign destination. Apart from touching base with counterparts and sightseeing, however, you wonder how much can be accomplished by ASEAN leaders. As in 1997 when the Asian economic crisis started, this is a bad time for the region. Currencies are falling, factories are closing down or laying off workers, and investors are fleeing, many of them to China. An ASEAN attempt to come to each other’s rescue in case of speculative attacks on currencies has proved useless in the latest crisis.

Worse, bandits in the Philippines and Malaysia have discovered how lucrative ransom kidnapping can be. Strengthening security cooperation can be one area where President Arroyo and Mahathir can make some solid inroads during her brief visit to Kuala Lumpur. ASEAN has traditionally shunned security matters, but the Abu Sayyaf capers since last year have highlighted the need for more joint patrols in the waters shared by the two countries.

There are other objectives that may be attainable when the President meets with her ASEAN counterparts. She said she planned to revive the concept of an East Asian growth area among Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. This time she can offer "doable" details to make the concept take off. She is also pushing for better cooperation among ASEAN in the promotion of information and communications technology.

Apart from putting 10 nations under an umbrella organization, ASEAN has served as little more than a social club. Modest objectives in regional cooperation may give the grouping a more relevant role.