Category: Frontiers

There is a new Philippine president. Noynoy Aquino has stepped into the challenging role as “hope of the nation” and has selected his Cabinet that promises a corruption-free Philippines. It is particularly outstanding because of the presence of designated Department of Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, the former Human Rights Commissioner who bravely sought to uncover the bloody hands behind countless assassinations and murders of social activists, human rights workers and leaders of civil society. She had the courage to challenge the police and military that was blocking the Commission’s investigators who were finally stymied by the judge who would not issue a search warrant for the Commission’s investigators to search a killing field in Davao where body parts were uncovered, some of them of women and children.  With this promising start in the new administration of President Aquino, there is optimism that the protection of the most vulnerable in society will take priority and there will be an end to death squads, assassinations, and the rampant violation of human rights by those supposed to protect the citizens from such evils and injustices but are frequently the perpetrators themselves. Considering the impunity enjoyed by assassins and death squads around the country under the Arroyo administration, the government of President Noynoy Aquino has to question the training methods and strategies taught to Philippine troops and police by the US International Military Education & Training (IMET). Hundreds of police and military personnel are trained annually here and abroad and that training appears to inculcate excessive aggression, brutality and combative killing methods deployed with “extreme prejudice” against social activists, even priests and dissidents arbitrarily branded as “enemies of state.” The role of the police and military as protectors and enforcers of the rule of law for victims and law-abiding citizens seems to be lost. Respect for human rights apparently is not on the training agenda and this is what needs to be changed.  Secretary Leila de Lima has the most challenging of tasks. She has made her priorities clear by her past words backed by action and resolve. First of all, is the desire to promote those just and honest, intelligent prosecutors that love the rule of law and are people of integrity. These are the prosecutors that are dedicated to the protection of abused women and children, victims of human rights violations and heinous crimes and have compassion for the children in conflict with the law. Secretary of Justice de Lima will clean out the corrupt and incompetent prosecutors, the protectors of child rapists and who take the stuffed envelops and dismisses the complaints despite the most overwhelming of evidence. It is only with her planned overhaul of the Department that she will be able to dispel the cynicism and lack of trust of the people in the Department of Justice lost during the past decade. There are good people in the DOJ that must be given a chance to do good and not be overruled by the corrupt officials on the

A very good friend, of my young ages from the time of the Lycée Français, had an operation last week. When I visited her, I could not avoid the tears for the deep feelings of love and compassion for her in her suffering. I had come from the Jamat Khana; it was Friday and I really felt like praying. Among those remembered, Teresinha’s health was part of the humble request to God’s infinite mercy and generosity. I normally take the tasbih (the rosary for remembering the most beautiful names of God). She is Catholic, however, after all the years of shared experiences – some happier than others. I asked her to hold on to my tasbih. She tightened it in her cold hand. While I was leaving the room, I asked God one more time, that her suffering was lessened. Yes, because life is pain, and pain is part of living; the only thing we can ask for from Allah is that it is lessened, minimized.  She rang the next day. I had meetings and was late. She anxiously wanted me to see how well she looked and most importantly that the “thing” I had put in her hand made her feel at peace and more at ease with the experience. I gave it to her and said that she could use it to remember God’s most beautiful names. After all, Muslims have only 99 and, according to scholars, there are 999 names, spread across the Holy Scriptures; the last one is only known to God Himself. Thence, she had plenty to choose from. However, she wanted to learn what I say and how I say. Once more, we shared the unity of love and friendship which are above differences of religion, but close to our humanness, as women, as mothers, as spouses, as individuals who have similar kinds of fears, joys, and anxieties. Last night, my 6-year-old son expressed his before-sleep-concern: his best schoolmate wished he was Catholic, rather than Muslim; that way they could be more similar, closer in friendship. Because, he said: “Jesus is God; not Allah.” He did not know what to do; they love each other so dearly. I could only remember a couple of Quranic verses: “Had God wished, He would have made us one community; instead, he wanted us to exceed ourselves and among each other, according to our interpretations of the faith, in good deeds towards our societies and the world” (the word is taqwa, which by the way, comes some 200 times in the Holy Qur’an). Then, God also says in the Qur’an: “I have made You out of ONE SOUL ONLY, and from there, a multitude of peoples and societies, so that, in your differences, you could know each other.” A little later, my son was already profoundly asleep in the couch, next to us. I do not know what his dreams were; inshallah, they had something to do with the beauty of our common humanity, and especially because we