I GOT bato on my 48th year. And it’s not what you think. It was neither about the new chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP), nor the illegal substance that has now became a marker of death. It certainly did not mean that I was bored, and no, for all the messes I am in or cause, I was mercifully not pelted with stones.
I meant I got a cluster of crystals of the clear quartz kind for my birthday, and the salutations that came with them made the stones even more special. The messages were about conflict transformation that Philippine society and many others need to undertake.
Quartz crystal formation and properties provide effective references for dealing with violent conflicts, of which the Philippines has many.
The crystals had come from the Gran Paradiso National Park in the Italian Alps, more than 4,000 meters above sea level and near the glaciers. Quartz crystals take a long time and the process of nucleation to form. Nucleation entails molecules attracting, bonding, and reaching a critical mass.
Much like crystals, peace processes that address armed conflicts mean parties initially “bond” by agreeing to explore options for finding non-violent ways of resolving problems. This is a critical stage.
The peace talks between the Philippine Government and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) to resolve the armed conflict officially started in 1992, nearly a quarter of a century, but the bonding seems to be particularly tenuous.
Although there had been many successes, with build-up including the signing of at least 30 agreements such as the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG) and the Comprehensive Agreement to Respect Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL), the talks had been suspended and terminated a few times, and reached an impasse during the term of President Benigno Simeon Aquino III.
Perhaps like crystals, what is necessary for the peace process to not just form but more importantly grow, is the involvement of other sectors that would constitute a broad peace constituency. Durable peace does not only concern the formal parties of government and non-state armed groups, but also members of society who have been victimized by the conflict or the causes that underpin them, and those that are desirous of change. Those who are from outside but are willing to journey together for peace with a conflict-affected society could help in the growth of peace.
The GPH-NDFP peace constituency which started out broadly in the mid-1980s has unfortunately thinned out, and worse, has become associated with organizations perceived to be Left-leaning. Hopefully, the strong message of President Rodrigo RoaDuterte about the resumption of the talks, and the willingness of both government and the NDFP to go back to the negotiating table would encourage more Filipinos to follow closely the talks, participate, and urge the parties to continue whenever there are glitches.
Crystals, which are the second most dominant mineral on the Earth’s crust, possess common essential properties. According to kacha-stones.com crystals are able to “structure, store, amplify, focus, transmit and transform energy.” Literally “stones from paradise”, the quartz crystals from Gran Paradiso are also known as the Shaman’s stone and are said to have healing effects. Quartz crystals from the Alps are particularly valued for their curative benefits on the stomach and thyroid.
When I heard these, I thought how apropos. The GPH-NDFP conflict has strong roots in the economic, political and cultural subjugations and inequities that started during the colonial period, and were extended and normalized by existing arrangements and norms in the country. Poverty, signified by “kumakalam na tiyan” (rumbling stomach) has been often cited as a cause, and alternatively an effect, of the war being waged by the NDFP, the New People’s Army (NPA), the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and other related organizations.
This conflict which has raged for nearly half a century also affects how the country would move forward, in what direction, and for which purposes. Like the thyroid hormones that are significant for the development of the human body, there can be no development for the country without a just resolution of what has been called the “people’s protracted war” and the transformation of the causes, factors and actors involved.
The third message was about how the quartz were located at a high altitude, hidden from view, and had to be looked for. Changes in the glaciers—perhaps due to factors associated with climate change—had allowed the crystals to be exposed, but they still had to be dug out.
Conflict transformation requires vision, as well as effort and persistence at different levels. The peace talks are the formal face of the process, but trust building among parties, support to affected sectors and communities, and the conscientization of Filipinos about the necessity of the peace process and conflict transformation will also have to take place.
Paraphrasing the words of lawyer Carlos Castresana Fernandez, Public Prosecutor of the Supreme Court of Spain and a member of the Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala, a society with a violent past needs to ensure that violence will not accompany it as that society moves into the future.
Conflict transformation and efforts to pursue the acknowledged pillars of successful dealing with the past—the rights to know, justice, reparation and guarantee of non-recurrence—will help make this resolute leaving behind of armed conflicts, their roots and consequences possible.
We do not want a final peace pact signed between the GPH and NDFP only to have violence manifest itself again and again afterwards. For there have been many countries that inked peace agreements, only to find themselves mired in continuing or new wars because they had not addressed the conditions that would prevent the repetition of the failures, weaknesses, and excesses of the past.
The pursuit of peace can be precipitated by facilitating conditions. Perhaps the single-mindedness and unorthodox ways of the 16th President of the Philippines would be among such factors. But continued violations of human rights—which is the opposite of the Rule of Law—and unchecked corruption in the judiciary and security institutions that are supposed to enable the dispensation of justice, would undermine the peace process.
The quartz crystals and the reflections on conflict transformation—gems of a kind—were among the many gifts of learning and grace that I received at the Dealing with the Past Advanced Learning Course for Professionals 2016 of the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs in cooperation with the non-government organization swisspeace.
That these gems were gifts of Andrea Reichlin, Ambassador of Switzerland to the Philippines, Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau—an extraordinary, astute, and kind woman, and passionate supporter of peace—was in a manner of speaking the proverbial icing on my birthday cake.
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