Category: Maguindanao massacre

The wealth of public officials, the weal of voters: Mismatch?

mcmangahas Leave a comment

WHO ARE THE RICHEST elective officials of the Philippines, and who, the poorest?

Did they rise to greater affluence or fall to greater penury over the years?

And, is there a match or mismatch between the wealth of public officials, and the weal of the people they serve?

We have 10 days to go before the vote on May 13, 2013 so we better check it out now.
MoneyPolitics, a citizen’s resource tool on elections, public funds, and governance in the Philippines, may be of some assistance.

Click on its Public Profiles tab to learn about the numbers enrolled in the Statement of Assets, Liabilities, and Net Worth (SALN) that top elective officials had filed, and subscribed and swore to as the facts of their wealth.

This tab offers full profiles on the wealth of the president, vice president, and senators.

Just as important this tab reveals the net worth of the party-list and district representatives, and the governors and vice governors of Philippine provinces.

These data came from the SALNs that PCIJ secured from the Office of the Ombudsman and other repository agencies.

But another tab, Elections and Governance will lead you to the lists of candidates in the 2013 elections and the voter turnout in the 2010 elections that PCIJ obtained from the Commission on Elections.

A page within this tab offers the latest socio-economic stats for the provinces, based on data from the National Statistical Coordination Board and the National Statistics Office, among other public agencies.

Why tap into these tabs?

The first, Public Profiles, might give us an initial KYC (Know Your Candidate) experience. Nothing wrong per se about candidates being rich but it is absolutely wrong in law for public officials to enrich themselves while in office.

The second, Elections and Governance, could give us our composite picture as communities, the living and working conditions of our people. It points to some bright spots, and many dark corners, in our country. It tells us what those aspiring to get elected on May 13, 2013 should address or speak about.

More than song and dance routines, perhaps we should demand that candidates tell us exactly how they intend to serve us better.

MoneyPolitics, a data journalism project of PCIJ, is just a click away.

PCIJ’s ANGKAN, INC., a docu on Maguindanao’s clans

Ed Lingao Leave a comment

THE PHILIPPINE CENTER FOR INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM (PCIJ) is proud to announce the broadcast of ANGKAN, INC., a special five-part documentary on the clans of Maguindanao as part of TV5′s Balwarte series on Sunday, April 28, at 10 p.m.

The documentary, produced by the PCIJ with the assistance of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Commission on Human Rights, takes a deeper look at the political, social, and economic influence of the various clans that have lorded over Maguindanao in the last few centuries. This influence is especially evident in the May 2013 elections, where at least 80 members of the Ampatuan clan are running for public office in various capacities, from town councilor to mayor. Senior members of the Ampatuan clan have been implicated in the 2009 Maguindanao massacre, where 58 people including 32 journalists were murdered in the worst case of election violence in the country.

But as the documentary shows, the case of the Ampatuans is not entirely unusual, as Maguindanao’s electoral races have long been the playground of the province’s clans. The Sangki clan, for example, is fielding 26 candidates, while the Midtimbangs are fielding 25. The Mangudadatu clan, the main rival of the Ampatuans, is fielding 18, even as their bailiwick is really in the neighboring province of Sultan Kudarat.

Interestingly, the proliferation of the clans and their continued and consistent dominance in Maguindanao does not seem to have had any positive effect on the socioeconomic development of Maguindanaoans. The province continues to wallow at the bottom with economic indicators showing very little progress over the decades.

The documentary also traces the evolution of the royal clans of the Sultanate of Maguindanao into today’s political clans, and how patronage politics on both the local and national level reinforce and perpetuate this clan system.

The print version of the documentary may also be read here:

The PCIJ series on Maguindanao is the first of a series of studies on the political clans that rule over significant portions of the country. In the next three years, the PCIJ will also be doing print stories and documentaries on other political clans in the Visayas and Luzon with assistance from the UNDP and CHR.

Watch the Maguindanao documentary tonight, April 28, on TV5′s Balwarte election series.

Understanding the clans of Maguindanao

Ed Lingao Leave a comment

CULTURAL NUANCES, economic and historical contexts, and a bewildering political milieu – understanding all these factors and how they relate to each other is the only way one can hope to understand the persistence of political clans and their continued dominance in Philippine politics.

During the launch of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism’s (PCIJ) series of stories on the clans of Maguindanao, several experts stressed the need for journalists to go beyond the counting of names and listing of numbers of the political candidates in order to better explain why the clans still reign supreme in the province.


PCIJ’s Malou Mangahas on the objective of the PCIJ project

The PCIJ stories and a video documentary on the clans of Maguindanao were presented to the public in a briefing/forum in Quezon City last April 11. Joining the activity were several political, social, and cultural experts from both Manila and Maguindanao. The project was assisted by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Commission on Human Rights.

The Maguindanao study is only the first of a series of efforts to better understand and explain the persistence of the clans in Philippine politics. While Maguindanao serves as the pilot province for the initial effort, the PCIJ will be conducting similar studies in other island groups in Visayas and Luzon. This, as Maguindanao is far from the only province in the country with an army of political families that are dominating a particular area, says Asian Institute of Management Policy Center director Ronald U. Mendoza.

Atty. Laisa Alamia, chairperson of the Regional Human Rights Commission for the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), said the PCIJ study was a very good start to understanding the nature and characteristics of dynasties wherever they may be.


Atty Laisa Alamia of the Regional Human Rights Commission on the importance of context

“This is a good start. The challenge is for all of us to continue doing this and for PCIJ to continue also doing this to help us in trying to find solutions to the problems in the ARMM,” Alamia said in the forum.

AIM’s Mendoza also endorsed the PCIJ investigative report as a model for looking into the historical and political contexts of the dynasties in the country.


AIM’s Dr. Ronald Mendoza on the national context

Another guest, Mussolini Lidasan of the Al Qalam Institute of the Ateneo de Davao, was a good example of the importance of nuancing in the reportage of dynasties. A Datu, Lidasan is one of many clan members who are engaged in civil society work to strengthen political and social structures in his home province.

The PCIJ series on the Maguindanao clans may be read here:

Ampatuans, web of kin, warp Maguindanao polls

Maguindanao’s misery: Absence of officials, absence of rage, poverty

Nat’l politicos prop dynasties as surrogates to win polls

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Manila’s shame: Nat’l politicos prop clans to win elections

mcmangahas Leave a comment

THE DATU system, an ancient political and social structure that has defined much of the history of the southern Philippines, provides continuity between a proud past and the tumultuous present in Maguindanao.

Yet it is one that has radically evolved — some would even say corrupted –into what many outsiders now perceive to be a system of patronage, corruption, inefficiency, and ruthlessness, especially in the province. As a result, the clans it has produced in the province are now perceived by many as the poster children of the worst kind of political dynasties.

But the problem is not a homegrown local phenomenon alone. National politicians and national poliical parties in Manila have also to share much of the blame: To win elections and to achieve political pre-eminence, they have cultivated datus or clans of choice as surrogates. They have stripped transformed the datus from traditional and religious leaders into political lieutenants.

It started with the American colonial administration, carried on to President Manuel L. Quezon who practically banned datuism in the 1935 Constitution, to the late strongman Ferdinand E. Marcos, and on to all the presidents that followed after the 1986 EDSA People Power revolt. Each president actually chose each his/her own favored datu or clan.

The story of the Ampatuans is most instructive. At the height of the Moro rebellion in the 1970s, however, Andal Ampatuan Sr. was not yet pandering to Malacañang. Like his grandfather. he became a rebel, his town of Ampatuan being “one of the sites of the fiercest fights, especially Christian and Muslim fights.”

In 1987, Andal Sr. ran and won as mayor of Maganoy, now named Shariff Aguak. The year 2001 was another turning point for the Ampatuans, with Andal Sr. elected governor of Maguidanao. It is said that Andal had the backing of the military, because his main rival, Zacaria Candao, was widely perceived to be coddling to Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

In Manila, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo was busy struggling to consolidate her position after ousting Joseph Estrada in the second People Power revolt. Hounded by questions of legitimacy, Arroyo was besieged by pro-Estrada supporters who rioted in front of Malacañang in May 2001. All in all, the time was ripe for the interests of Andal Sr. and Gloria Arroyo to intersect.

In the years that followed, Andal Sr. carefully built his relationship with both military and political leaders on the regional and national levels.

Retired Lt. Gen. Raymundo Ferrer, who served as martial law administrator of Maguindanao after the 2009 Maguindanao Massacre, acknowledges that the Ampatuan clan wielded an inordinate amount of influence on virtually all levels, even beyond the confines of Central Mindanao. It was a kind of clout that was unique to the Ampatuans, he says, and could not be seen with other political clans all over the Philippines.

“The clans were that powerful, to a point where they choose which battalion commander will be appointed there, or brigade commander,” he says. “Or even division commander, they can make a special request to higher authority. They can show that if you do not cooperate they can call on people higher than you.”

In large measure, Maguindanao remains a changeless story for now. National politicians have gone a-courting the clans again. Team P-Noy of the Liberal Party ruling coalition, as well as the opposition United Nationalist Alliance have adopted and endorsed their respective shares of candidates from the clans in the May 2013 elections. Party platform or philosophy seems to have little to do with the choices, more than the candidates’ winnability.

Yet still, the tide of change has started to take root in Maguindanao, as much as in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. “Young Moros” and civil society groups are now taking their place of honor in the political discourse, and transformation of the province and the region.

Read Part 3 and the Sidebars of “The Clan Politics of Maguindanao” here:

Part 3: National politicos prop dynasties to win elections
Sidebar: The wealth of Gov. Toto
Sidebar: The Change-makers

Maguindanao’s misery in excelsis: ‘Capitol on wheels’, absentee execs

mcmangahas Leave a comment

OVER THE LAST forty years, the seat of power in the province of Maguindanao has moved location six times, or just about anywhere its governor wishes o hold office. It has been a virtual “capitol on wheels.”

“The problem we have observed in Maguindanao is the new Governor always transfers the provincial capitol,” says Bobby Taguntong, Maguindanao spokesman for the Citizens Coalition for ARMM Electoral Reform or CCARE, a civil society group pushing for reforms in the election process in Mindanao. “Maybe we can suggest to the national government to make the provincial capitol mobile, perhaps even install tires.”

It is far more than an issue of confusion and inconvenience for those who need to conduct business in the capitol, wherever it may be relocated to next. Rather, the tale of the moving capitol symbolizes a bigger problem seen in places where governance is more personal than political, where families overrule political parties, and where blood trumps ideas and ideologies.

But the misery of inefficient and poor governance that is Maguindanao does not end there. Far too many candidates from a dozen political clans are running yet again in May 2013. This is amid the picture of absentee local executives that repeats in many of the 36 towns of the province. These candidates seem so excited to claim and grab the perks of office, but not to serve and work, when elected.

Just as worrisome, many voters seem to have scaled down their expectations of their leaders, according to Mindanao analysts. No public demand for good roads, more schools, better health care, more jobs; nor is there public rage over the severe lack of these services. The voters, analysts say, have just a few simple wishes of their leaders — don’t grab or buy off our land, leave us in peace, don’t harass, torture, or kill.

Read the PCIJ’s report on “The Clan Politics of Maguindanao” here:

Part 2: Maguindanao’s misery: Absentee officials, absence of rage, poverty

Sidebar 2: Cash for cops and soldiers

Maguindanao was spun off from the greater Cotabato empire province in 1973, the first governor, Simeon Datumanong, held office in Limpongo, in what is now Datu Hoffer town.

His successor, Zacaria Candao, held office on PC Hill in Cotabato City before resigning in 1977.

The replacement governor, Datu Sanggacala Baraguir of Sultan Kudarat town, naturally wanted the capitol in his bailiwick, and had a new capitol built in Sultan Kudarat.

The fourth governor, Sandiale Sambolawan, returned the provincial government to Shariff Aguak.

Then Datu Andal Salibo Ampatuan Sr. was elected governor in May 2001. He built a grand columned capitol almost right beside the municipal hall of Shariff Aguak, where he used to hold office as mayor.

A few years later, Andal Sr. would build a new and even more opulent provincial capitol, complete with a driveway that rivals a small EDSA flyover and a private toilet that houses a Jacuzzi, a stone’s throw away from the old capitol, on land that is rumored to be his own.

After the 2010 elections, Esmael Mangudadatu, the current governor who succeeded Andal Sr., moved the provincial capitol to his hometown of Buluan, accessible from Maguindanao only if one passes through Sultan Kudarat province first.

At first, Mangudadatu referred to the new capitol as the Satellite Office of the Provincial Government. Later, to avoid complications and questions, he renamed the place as the Maguindanao Peace Center.