(2nd of Three Parts)

THE coming together of more than 5,000 delegates representing different cooperatives from the six regions of Mindanao on October 29, 2009 to attend the Mindanao Cooperative Peace Forum at Xavier University Gymnasium will signal the first salvo of the peace building initiatives by the cooperative movement in this rich but poverty stricken island.

They will have the privilege of presenting to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo herself their collective outcry for peace aptly called, the Mindanao Cooperative Declaration for Peace.

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In that declaration are the paths to peace that include the urgent call for a paradigm shift from conventional to sustainable agriculture that underscores the imperatives of ecological integrity and food sovereignty. Indeed, there can never be peace unless the people have enough food to eat. There can be no security unless we stop our accelerating drive towards ecological disasters. There will always be conflict where the inhabitants are further marginalized and disempowered to have control and access over their resources.

It is the popular clamor of the cooperatives that the marginalized sectors (Muslims, Lumads, small farmers, fisherfolk) be given the preferential use rights in developing their respective resources and that their cooperatives be accorded with the utmost priority in the use and management of such resources, giving them the license, franchise and whatever privilege to handle key economic activities, i.e., planting industrial crops, sustainable mining, fishing, etc. based on the universal principle that the use of the God-given resources should accrue to the benefit of the bulk of the people and not just for a few.

The ecological systems are only ours to protect for the coming generations but at the rate that we have devastated the environment, we have robbed our children of their inheritance. We are aware that we are facing ecological crisis that unless soon averted will lead to an impending environmentally-based social, political and economic collapse. Peace among the people and peace between the homo sapiens and nature.

Furthermore, peace building can also be had through rights-based management of utilities, be water or electricity. This is based on the truism that the means to life such as water and energy should be owned by the consumers themselves based on the moral concept that the users should be the owners.

The cooperatives have long been advocating to cooperativize so-called Electric Cooperatives and Water Utilities. These advocacies will be further enhanced during the Forum. It is our firm belief that when these basic utilities are owned and managed by the member-consumers, it will lower down the cost and somehow reduce the incidence of poverty in Mindanao. More importantly, the member-consumers will exercise their God-given right of decision making.

It has been said that it is neither the past nor the present that will shape the future but it is our vision that will determine what will be the scenario ahead. Notwithstanding the fact that the war in Mindanao is the second longest running conflict in the world which started in the 16th century, notwithstanding the intricacies of the problems, the cooperatives firmly believe that when the Mindanawons will focus its vision towards peace and work together to reach out to that noble quest, then, this beautiful paradise and its wonderful inhabitants will not be battered anymore., (To be continued tomorrow.)