THE drive to overcome hardships to serve others surfaced as one of the shared traits among a group of individuals and institutions now vying for a prestigious award.
The Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc. (RAFI) presented yesterday the finalists for the Ramon Aboitiz Award for Exemplary Individual and the Eduardo Aboitiz Award for Outstanding Institutions.
Launched in 1996, the RAFI Triennial Awards recognize individuals and institutions who have dedicated themselves to building a more humane, equitable, and caring society.
“All of you deserve recognition,” said Evelyn Nacario-Castro, the foundation’s vice president for governance and linkages. The Triennial Awards’ spirit, she added, may be summed up by a poem written by Fr. Ken Untener, part of which reads, “We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.”
“We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own.”
The challenge of charity
The winners, the seventh batch in the Triennial Awards, will be revealed on Aug. 31.
“For those young people listening, you can never go wrong with charity,” said Dr. Benedict Valdez, 47, a trauma surgeon in Davao City who is one of the individual finalists.
Apart from leading the Emergency Medical Department of the Southern Philippines Medical Center, he serves as medical director of the 911 Emergency Medical Services and as president of the Maharlika Charity Foundation.
Another finalist, Dr. Roel Cagape, who is in his early 50s, has spent more than two decades providing health care to communities in the remotest parts of Saranggani, like the Blaan tribe in Malapatan. To overcome difficulties, he thought of solutions such as using hammocks carried by horses (“ambulansyang kabayo”) to transport patients.
He draws inspiration from a prayer by St. Ignatius of Loyola, asking God for the generosity “to toil and not to seek for rest, to labor and not to ask for reward.”
Finalist Sarah Cubar, 55, has opened 15 schools in Kapalong, Davao del Norte since July 2015 because she didn’t want the distance or the lack of resources to keep the children of indigenous communities from gaining an education. Cubar was once a grade-school dropout, and it is that experience, she says, that drives her to “bring education to these children’s doorsteps.”
A determined spirit
She emphasized that running the schools is “a team effort” with the schools heads in her district.
Since October 2015, finalist Norman Pagal of San Remigio, Cebu has been paralyzed in the lower half of his body after getting shot—a consequence, he believes, of his campaign against illegal fishing.
The 47-year-old remains a fish warden of the town. From his wheelchair on the shores of Barangay Anapog, he uses binoculars to scan the marine sanctuary and summons the Bantay Dagat team using a phone or wireless radio whenever he sees illegal fishers there.
Rounding up the individual finalists is Mateo Quilas of Bohol, where he serves as the persons with disabilities (PWD) affairs officer of the Provincial Government. An organization that he began with 11 persons in 1998 (only one of whom could see and whom they needed to record the minutes of their meetings), now has some 8,600 members.
Quilas, now 59, continues to campaign for the enforcement of the Accessibility Law and the universal design for persons with disabilities. He relies on “fighting spirit and determination” to help PWDs gain skills and jobs, instead of begging, and is campaigning as well for barrier-free tourism in Bohol.
The finalists in the outstanding institution category are the Community-Based Health Program of the Diocese of Ipil, Zamboanga-Sibugay; Negrense Volunteers for Change Foundation based in Bacolod City; Philippine Eagle Foundation of Davao City; Tuburan for Rural Women Empowerment and Development of Negros Oriental; and PROCESS-Bohol Inc. based in Tagbilaran City. (MICHAEL REY M. CORTES, CIT-U Intern)