Heart and Healing Down South

A bullet pierced through Babu’s left breast as she was tending their farm in Carmen, North Cotabato. It was quick, she remembers, but the pain was all over her body at once, and she went numb. It was the height of the war between the Ilagas, a Christian terrorist organization, and the Blackshirts, a Muslim armed band, in the ’60s, and there were no doctors or any form of medical assistance. The wound had to heal by itself.

Today, at 91, Babu’s face is lined with wrinkles, her body marked with scars, not of one war but many. From the Japanese occupation in the ’40s to the fierce fighting between Muslims and Christians in the ’60s to the Martial Law bloodbath in the ’70s and the recent all-out war against the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), Babu has lived through the horrors of the Mindanao conflict–and survived.

"Some wounds are so deep, they don’t heal easily," she says.

According to the United Nations, Babu is referred to as an internally displaced person or IDP, one who has been forced to flee her home as a result of armed conflict. IDPs can also be people driven from their homelands due to "situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights, or natural or human-made disasters, and who have not crossed an internationally recognized state border."

But what is it really like to be displaced?

"There was bombing and shelling by the military in our area," recalls Melissa, a day care teacher in Barangay Macual, Pikit, North Cotabato. "I saw houses burning, including my own house...Bombs hit cows, carabaos and other farm animals in the village...We had a very long walk then, almost seven kilometers from our place to the evacuation centers. We were exhausted. Some of the children and young people were very afraid and nervous."

Tomina, a mother of three from Barangay General Luna in Carmen, North Cotabato, shares a similar experience. "When we evacuated, I had just given birth to my second child, he was about two months old. Without warning, the military arrived... about 12 tanks...we were not able to do anything or bring anything. We walked down the road to the barangay captain’s house, roughly two and a half kilometers to Lanitap...my child got sick with diarrhea and all I could give him was a drink of boiled guava leaves," she recalls.

Babu, Melissa and Tomina are only three of the hundreds of thousands of people displaced by the recurring armed conflict in Mindanao over the past 30 years.

In alternating periods of relative peace, they have returned to their villages countless times to rebuild their lives, only to be driven out again by renewed hostilities.

In the absence of lasting peace, how do humanitarian organizations keep up with the overwhelming need to provide relief to people caught in the crossfire of warfare?

The Community and Family Services International (CFSI) has been asking that question for the past 25 years that it has been assisting IDPs in many regions of the world, and finds the answer always wanting in the face of massive dislocations and monumental struggles of peoples perpetually in flight from threats.

"The problem was enormous," Steven Muncy, CFSI executive director, tells STARweek. Humanitarian organizations like CFSI have had to deal with the weight of war and other forms of societal violence that never seem to end, like the long years of disquiet in war-torn Mindanao.

Since coming to the south in 2000, CFSI has assisted approximately 35,000 persons affected by armed conflict, around 14,000 of whom have been returned to their communities of origin. Yet the need for humanitarian assistance remains huge.

Muncy says that when hostilities cease, IDPs have to face the essential struggle for survival in their devastated villages, a kind of war in itself–against extreme poverty, ignorance and under-development.

In Barangay Bagoinged, Pikit, North Cotabato, for instance, which was at the center of the military offensive in Central Mindanao in 2003, Muslim families have returned to their old community. But home for the 349 people or 39 families is no better than the evacuation centers. In a survey conducted by CFSI to determine the community’s unmet needs, 95 percent of the respondents said they have no water, 87 percent have no access to a sanitary toilet, 80 percent have no source of livelihood, 97 percent of those 10 years old and above are not in school and 75 percent said they need better houses for their families.

"We at CFSI help communities like Bagoinged identify their needs and priorities, help them meet these needs, either through direct assistance from us or through the help of funding agencies. We also help them help themselves because we do not want them to rely on aid," Muncy says.

Most local government units, he explains, especially the high-functioning ones, are willing to put up a modest counterpart fund. But in the absence of financial resources, most have human resources and are willing to provide the labor.

It’s a painstaking process, to say the least. And each community has specific needs, although most of the top needs are very basic and are similar–such as school houses for their children, better homes for their families, livelihood opportunities, electrification, water and sanitation facilities.

In Babu’s hometown in North Cotabato, at least 50 out-of-school youths were assisted to start livelihood projects. In Melissa’s barrio in Inug-ug, an elementary school was built, teachers were hired and school supplies were provided. There are now over 700 students enrolled in the school.

Across Central Mindanao, more than 100 Harmony Play Centers were also put up to care for and educate some 3,000 three- to five-year-old children. Twenty-five Educational Reconstruction Committees (ERCs) were established in 25 conflict-affected areas to hasten the rebuilding process.

However, considering that uprooted persons in Mindanao run into hundreds of thousands, humanitarian assistance is a continuous process.

"I wish we could respond more quickly," says Muncy, "but there is always more work than humanly possible and expectations are also high."

Muncy credits the Fili-pino social worker’s resiliency in the face of very difficult challenges. "Filipinos have a genuine heart for others," he says.

The bulk of CFSI’s workforce are Filipinos. Although only around 40 are regular staff, the operation is driven by a large number of volunteers.

Babu recalls that CFSI personnel always talked to her and it was something that made her feel important and part of the community, despite her old age.

"I learned and felt that what I have to say is also important to them. I felt they really cared and wanted to help, so I told them what we needed," she says.

"As a sumpat (evacuee), I learned a lot in the seminars. I wanted to join the other seminars but I had to give way to others so that they too may learn," says Hasan, a community leader in Barangay Dungguan, Pagagawan, Maguindanao, in the dialect.

"Because of the meetings, we learned what we need and how to meet them," adds Gapur, a farmer from Barangay General Luna in Carmen, North Cotabato.

CFSI’s objective is to develop conditions that would encourage safe return or resettlement and facilitate the process of transition, but part of its mission is also to provide a foundation for peace building and sustainable development.

"If you cannot have peace in Mindanao, there will be no development in the region or in the Philippines," he says.

But peace building, for this American social worker who has been involved in humanitarian work in the Philippines and in Southeast Asia through CFSI for the past 25 years, does not happen overnight.

"We train our people for sustainable development work and genuine humanitarian service. This includes mitigating risks associated with the job," he says.

It is unfortunate, he discloses, that in conflict areas anywhere in the world today, humanitarian workers have themselves become targets of attacks.

"Part of the difficulties we need to overcome is to avoid the loss of lives," he shares. "Even the efforts that you do can be threatening to others."

Last June, CFSI mourned the death of a social worker–it was and will always be a deep loss.

As an American at the helm of CFSI operations in the south, isn’t he afraid that he is also vulnerable to attack and that his mere presence in the areas of conflict, especially notorious for abducting or harming foreigners, can open opportunities for lawless elements to take advantage of the situation?

"If I say that I don’t have any fears, I would be lying," he says. "But I have come to peace with the risks associated with my job. Part of our training for our social workers is managing security risks that is part of the package of community work."

Muncy arrived in the Philippines in late ’70s as part of a church-based volunteer group that did volunteer work for the refugee center in Bataan. In 1980, together with three Filipinos and another American volunteer, he established CFSI to respond to the psycho-social needs of Vietnamese refugees.

"We provided counselling for refugees displaced by the Vietnam war," he says. In 17 years, 360,000 persons passed through the Bataan refugee center; most have been resettled in the US, Canada, Norway and other host countries. Eventually CFSI’s humanitarian work expanded to accommodate refugees from other countries. Although based in the Philippines, it has set up operations in Myanmar, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Hong Kong.

One of its biggest projects outside of the Philippines is its work in Myanmar in partnership with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). According to the CFSI website, the cooperation started in Myanmar as early as 1998 to facilitate the return of Muslim refugees from Bangladesh, who had fled the country in 1992. In Myanmar as in Mindanao and other countries that CFSI has a presence, the organization’s work revolves around the same threads of humanitarian assistance: social development, child and family welfare, health promotion and research.

Between 1981 and 1997, CFSI has worked with approximately 360,000 Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Lao refugees in the Philippines. It has also assisted refugees from ten countries: Ethiopia, Somalia, Liberia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Iran, Iraq, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam. Majority of these refugees live in Metro Manila, but others live in various parts of the Philippines.

From his lifetime work with internally displaced peoples, especially in the Philippines, Muncy has this to say: "We need more social workers, we need to train more people for humanitarian service."

Muncy never learned to speak Filipino. "I know only enough words to get me in trouble," he laughs. But during his stay in the country, he managed to get a Masters degree in Public Health and a Phd also in Public Health from the University of the Philippines-Manila.

"I need to learn the social conditions in the Philippines and to adopt local solutions to local problems. I need to understand the context in which the needs of uprooted peoples are met," he says of his education.

As the formula for lasting peace has yet to be forged in Mindanao and development remains elusive, CFSI’s work, no matter that it is only a drop in the bucket against an ocean of need, will matter most to people in the greatest of need. The needs may be great and the challenges even greater, but Muncy sees in what is currently being done a lot of heart and healing.