{"id":7079,"date":"2015-07-28T13:15:46","date_gmt":"2015-07-28T17:15:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/?p=7079"},"modified":"2021-10-05T07:25:12","modified_gmt":"2021-10-05T11:25:12","slug":"mpi-2000-growing-branches-from-a-healthy-tree-trunk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/2015\/07\/mpi-2000-growing-branches-from-a-healthy-tree-trunk\/","title":{"rendered":"MPI, 2000: Growing Branches from a Healthy Tree Trunk"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_7081\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7081\" style=\"width: 660px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/MPI-Staff-e1437683824503.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-7081\" src=\"\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/MPI-Staff-e1437683824503.jpg\" alt=\"Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute (MPI) staffers\" width=\"660\" height=\"440\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7081\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Reporter Bonnie Lofton (center back) is surrounded by core team members of the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute (MPI) in late 2014. <small><i>(Photo by Gabrielle Aziza Sagarai)<\/i><\/small><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The origins of the first peacebuilding institute in Asia can be traced to a conversation in the home of <strong>John Paul <\/strong>and <strong>Wendy Lederach <\/strong>when they lived near EMU in 1998. John Paul was then the visionary behind EMU\u2019s 4-year-old Summer Peacebuilding Institute (SPI).<\/p>\n<p><strong>Myla Leguro <\/strong>recalls joining seven other Filipinos around the Lederachs\u2019 dining room table to talk about setting up a peacebuilding institute modeled after SPI in Mindanao. It would be located in the heart of the southern region of the Philippines where violent conflict had raged for generations.<a href=\"#footnotes\"><sup>[1]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Two years later, the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute (MPI) began holding summer training sessions, initially underwritten by Catholic Relief Services and Mennonite Central Committee. Two seasoned SPI instructors flew to the Philippines to teach at MPI\u2019s inaugural year: <strong>Nancy Good (Sider)<\/strong>, a social worker and an EMU faculty member, and <strong>Mohammed Abu-Nimer<\/strong>, a Muslim-Palestinian who had recently finished his PhD in the United States.<a href=\"#footnotes\"><sup>[2]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Over the next dozen years, as MPI grew to have more than 1,800 alumni, Mindanao gradually moved from being convulsed by near-constant warfare to experiencing a fragile peace across much of the island.<\/p>\n<p>In March 2014, the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front signed a comprehensive peace agreement, which paved the way for a new Muslim autonomous entity called \u201cBangsamoro.\u201d<a href=\"#footnotes\"><sup>[3]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_7082\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7082\" style=\"width: 267px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Myla-Leguro.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-7082\" src=\"\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Myla-Leguro-534x400.jpg\" alt=\"Myla Leguro\" width=\"267\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Myla-Leguro-534x400.jpg 534w, https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Myla-Leguro-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 267px) 100vw, 267px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7082\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Myla Leguro, SPI &#8217;98 &amp; &#8217;04, an administrator at Catholic Relief Services, was instrumental in founding MPI. <small><i>(Photo by Bonnie Price Lofton)<\/i><\/small><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Top-level peace negotiations had occurred over many decades, facilitated by leaders from largely Muslim countries. From 1976 to 1996, Indonesia facilitated the peace talks. From 1997 to the present, Malaysia has done so. Yet these negotiations also fell apart repeatedly \u2013 until the most recent series of talks leading to the 2014 agreement.<\/p>\n<p>How much credit for the current shift toward peace is traceable to the efforts of MPI in training hundreds of peacebuilders \u2013 who, in turn, trained or influenced thousands of others through their religious organizations, educational systems, neighborhoods, tribes, government agencies, military networks and nonprofit organizations?<\/p>\n<p>Tracing this influence is as impossible as determining exactly which molecules of water flowing in a river are traceable to a specific spring at the river\u2019s headwaters.<\/p>\n<p>Yet people knowledgeable about the decades of conflict in Mindanao point to MPI\u2019s key role as a constantly flowing spring of peacebuilding practices in the Philippines, merging with those of other springs, such as the Kadtuntaya Foundation Inc. and Southern Christian College, both based in southern Mindanao.<\/p>\n<h3>Trip to Cotabato<\/h3>\n<p>In October 2014, the five-hour minibus journey from Davao, the commercial hub of the island of Mindanao, to and from Cotabato City required passing through multiple checkpoints staffed by heavily armed government soldiers. (Cotabato City is a densely populated urban area with a mix of Christians and Muslims, surrounded by a largely Muslim province, where rebels have fought government troops for decades.)<\/p>\n<p>These soldiers looked bored, as if they were not expecting trouble. Only once were the passengers forced to disgorge themselves from their crammed-tight minivan. The only obvious Westerner among the passengers \u2013 a female reporter for <em>Peacebuilder <\/em>\u2013 had been advised to keep her head covered and to dress modestly for the duration of the trip to and from Cotabato, but the soldiers paid scant attention to this grandmother-aged woman. They seemed intent on checking everyone\u2019s belongings for something \u2013 explosives, arms, drugs, dangerous literature? It wasn\u2019t clear what. Apparently satisfied after 10 minutes of poking inside the van, they sternly waved everyone back inside.<\/p>\n<p>In Cotabato City, Rhea Silvosa, an MPI administrator in her 20s who was acting as guide and host, urged the Westerner to stay close to the perimeter of their hotel, where security guards hovered, until time to depart for a meeting. The worry? Some Westerners had been kidnapped for ransom in recent memory.<\/p>\n<p>Viewed from a slow-moving vehicle on packed streets, it felt as if Cotaboto were trying to decide if it would be a city at peace or not \u2013 and what its identity would be. Beyond a high fence surrounding a campus with the Catholic name of Notre Dame University, about three-quarters of the women appeared to be Muslim, with their heads covered by scarves. The other quarter of the women would have looked at home in Manila \u2013 with their flowing hair and tight jeans and T-shirts. Meanwhile, in the streets outside the campus, more than a few women were fully veiled, resembling women circulating publicly in Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n<p>A number of schools had draped peace-themed banners or mounted billboards at their entrances. \u201cThis school is a zone of peace\u201d was seen more than once.<\/p>\n<h3>The Kadtuntaya Foundation<\/h3>\n<p>At the Kadtuntaya Foundation Inc., headquartered in a two-story building in a densely populated residential neighborhood, seven staff members (five men and two women) who had taken MPI courses sat around a conference table on a Saturday \u2013 normally their day off \u2013 patiently ready to answer questions for <em>Peacebuilder<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>First a bit of background about the foundation: A couple who married across faith lines \u2013 he being Muslim, she being Christian \u2013 founded this nonprofit in 1989 to \u201cbridge the gap between the Christians and the Muslims as well as the non-Muslim indigenous tribes in Mindanao whose relationship had been strained by decades of conflict and wars,\u201d according to Kadtuntaya Foundation literature. The organization focused in the 1990s on \u201cfacilitating dialogues\u201d among these groups, \u201caimed at reducing prejudices, improving relationships, and forging mutual understanding and cooperation.\u201d<a href=\"#footnotes\"><sup>[4]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_7084\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7084\" style=\"width: 267px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Norlyn-Odin.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-7084\" src=\"\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Norlyn-Odin-534x400.jpg\" alt=\"Norlyn A. Odin\" width=\"267\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Norlyn-Odin-534x400.jpg 534w, https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Norlyn-Odin-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 267px) 100vw, 267px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7084\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Norlyn A. Odin, a Muslim woman on Kadtuntaya&#8217;s staff, seeks to empower women at the community level. <small><i>(Photo by Pop Manara Salagog)<\/i><\/small><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>As explained by <strong>Norlyn A. Odin<\/strong>, a Muslim woman on Kadtuntaya\u2019s staff, the decades of conflicts have had much more to do with socio-economic issues \u2013 such as rights to resources, livelihoods, and group identity and dignity \u2013 than with religion per se.<\/p>\n<p>The ancestors of the indigenous people were in the area first. They began to be marginalized and oppressed with the advent of Muslim missionaries and the growth of trade with Muslim countries in the 1300s. With the conversion of prominent local leaders, divisions developed over many generations between the descendants of the Muslims and of those who did not embrace Islam.<\/p>\n<p>Spanish colonial rule came in the mid 1500s, followed by U.S. occupation at the beginning of the 20th century. Colonialism shifted power to Christians, and programs of settling Christians in the southern Philippines began.<\/p>\n<p>The Marcos dictatorship of the 1970s and early 1980s brought large-scale atrocities and unparalleled armed conflict, fracturing communal relations and displacing masses of people. The Marcos regime also appropriated Mindanao land and handed it to large numbers of Christian settlers, who displaced both indigenous people and Muslim people.<\/p>\n<p>Of Kadtuntaya\u2019s seven staffers around the conference table that Saturday, two were Christians who did interfaith work; four were from the Muslim community (including one whose Muslim-rebel father had been tortured by government soldiers and one whose husband is a policeman); and one was of indigenous background, who was active in organizing a 10,000-person march in 2008 to insist on peace negotiations between the government and rebels and a 1,000-person march in 2009, where indigenous people called for recognizing their land rights.<\/p>\n<p>Kadtuntaya\u2019s focus on dealing simultaneously with all three major groups of people \u2013 and its considerable local credibility, especially among Muslim communities \u2013 made it an ideal partner for MPI, which invited it to send representatives to Davao for intensive training in peacebuilding from the early 2000s on.<\/p>\n<h3>Peace trainings<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Florderick T. Sanico<\/strong>, 35, spoke of how his Christian-settler family had lost members in the conflict \u2013 \u201cI\u2019m personally a victim of the violence.\u201d Kadtuntaya sent him to MPI in 2007 and he emerged feeling transformed by the training: \u201cIf you want peace, you have to start with yourself\u2026 I need to change my advocacy and attitudes away from violence.\u201d Under the auspices of Kadtuntaya, he went to work in \u201cvery remote areas\u201d where he brings together Muslims and Christians in a series of MPI-like trainings called the Grassroots Peace Learning Course.<\/p>\n<p>Catholic Relief Services started these trainings in 2003 to reach the widely dispersed communities affected by violence, initially using MPI-formed facilitators like Sanico, then using facilitators emerging from these trainings. More than 500 individuals from more than 200 organizations in Mindanao had come through these trainings by the close of 2014.<\/p>\n<p>The trainings are comprehensive, divided into nine modules, and may take up to 10 months to complete. The first four deal with self-understanding, the theory and tools of conflict transformation (extending over two modules), and Mindanao\u2019s history of both harmony and turbulence.<\/p>\n<p>The next two modules focus on \u201chorizontal peacebuilding\u201d \u2013 aimed at strengthening the ability of communities to effect change (in this vein, <em>Peacebuilder <\/em>interviewees often mentioned clan-to-clan troubles and the need for projects that increase collaboration).<\/p>\n<p>Two modules address \u201cvertical peacebuilding,\u201d aimed at helping communities at the base to influence governmental and other structures above them.<\/p>\n<p>And the final, ninth module, centers on participants designing action plans for their own contexts.<\/p>\n<h3>Stories show results<\/h3>\n<p>In 2010, Catholic Relief Services published 28 autobiographical stories of module participants, mostly written in their everyday languages of Tagalog or in Cebuano-Bisaya. Twelve of the stories eventually were translated into English in a 2011 booklet titled <em>Working for Peace: My Cloud\u2019s Silver Lining and Other Stories by Grassroots Peacebuilders in Mindanao.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>In one story, a 36-year-old woman talks about growing up in a place where killings were an everyday occurrence and then becoming a killer herself. \u201cWe did not care who got killed in the war \u2013 whether the victim was a child or an adult\u2026.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOne day, I woke up to the realization that my own kin and family had become victims of our group\u2026.I started distancing myself, moving from one place to another to start a new life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, she joined an organization consisting of three tribal groups, which sent her to take the Grassroots Peace Learning Course. She did the entire nine-module series and was sad when she had to say good-bye to those who studied with her \u2013 \u201cthe dear people I had grown to love, the people who accepted me despite knowing my past life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhile I may not be able to bring back the lives of the people who had become our victims, what is important is that I am no longer a problem to society. I am now one of those who builds peace.\u201d She went on to describe leading seminars, dialogues and other activities to spread the lessons she learned.<\/p>\n<p>Several others in the book describe laying down their guns as a result of doing the Grassroots Peace Learning Course. One Muslim man had a Christian neighbor whom he viewed as his enemy. Both neighbors ended up in the same peace-course cohort. And both changed so much that the Christian man, as he lay dying of an illness, asked the Muslim to take care of his family, a request lovingly met.<\/p>\n<h3>Wishing donors would visit for feedback<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Lo Ivan R. Castillon <\/strong>is one of the eight Christians (out of 47 workers) at the Kadtuntaya Foundation Inc. He graduated from a Roman Catholic institution, Notre Dame University in Cotabato City, where 70% of the students were Muslim. He confesses, though, that he harbored \u201cbiases regarding their behavior and attitudes\u201d until he underwent training to be a peacebuilder.<\/p>\n<p>In his Kadtuntaya work, Castillon writes monitoring reports that help his organization satisfy the requirements of funders. Currently these are two Catholic organizations (CRS and CORDAID), two Dutch organizations, and two German organizations (Bread for the World and Mensen met een Missie). Personally, he is more motivated by the stories he hears rather than the \u201cdry reports\u201d he produces, which is why he loves to get out to the field as much as possible.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI like to hear how people have changed their lives, overcome things, and now are positive sources of change,\u201d said Castillon. \u201cI like to hear women talk about how they were not recognized before in their communities and now they are leaders, about how peacebuilding makes a shy person to become a confident person.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He wishes more donors would come see such changes for themselves \u2013 to talk to community members who have seen schisms healed, violence come to be rejected by themselves and their neighbors \u2013 and realize the importance of supporting this work over the long term. \u201cWe need to work for peace for a lifetime \u2013 there are more challenges to come. We can\u2019t stop. This has to be a way of life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A trait of the Kadtuntaya Foundation is to midwife the birth of other initiatives, owned by the participants themselves. As an example, it has worked with dozens of organizations in the Consortium of Bangsamoro Civil Society, which (in turn) has helped organize early-warning, quick-response teams of farmers, fisherfolk, religious people, students and so forth to be voluntary peace monitors and advocates within their own communities across central and southwestern Mindanao. The teams are called Tiyakap Kilintad, meaning \u201ccare for peace.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>At the Christian college<\/h3>\n<figure id=\"attachment_7085\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7085\" style=\"width: 267px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Peace-Art-e1437684883983.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-7085\" src=\"\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Peace-Art-e1437684883983.jpg\" alt=\"Southern Christian College peace art\" width=\"267\" height=\"400\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7085\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">At Southern Christian College, peace&#8211;promoting arts are woven into the curriculum. Here two staffers flank a dove-centered creation. <small><i>(Photo by Pop Manara Salagog)<\/i><\/small><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Twenty-nine miles from Cotabato City resides Southern Christian College in the mid-sized city of Midsayap. One weekend morning in late October, 10 men and women assembled at the college\u2019s lovely, tree-lined campus to offer their stories of peace work.<\/p>\n<p>All but one of the 10 had taken MPI courses. Social work dean <strong>Melody Ambangan <\/strong>was the first from Southern Christian College to attend MPI. In 2009, six years after her first three MPI courses, she said she dug out her MPI course materials and used them to address gender issues, as well as the \u201canger and hurt,\u201d affecting the 100 or so students enrolled in the College of Social Work. (She also returned to MPI in 2009 and took a course she missed in her first round: \u201cIntroduction to Conflict Transformation.\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>Each summer, the college\u2019s Institute for Peace and Development Studies invites 30 young people (10 each from the three major populations in Mindanao) for a four-week residential summer program. Explicitly patterned after MPI, this institute has prepared more than 300 peacebuilders, who are now spread across the region as teachers, social workers, NGO employees, community volunteers, and government officials.<\/p>\n<p>One of those 300 peacebuilders was at the conference table, <strong>Rodelio Ambangan<\/strong>, Melody\u2019s husband. He directs the college\u2019s Institute for Peace and Development Studies and is the chairperson of the Mindanao Peoples Peace Movement, an alliance of more than 100 organizations encompassing 30,000 to 40,000 indigenous peoples from Mindanao\u2019s three major tribes and many smaller ones.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI learned peacebuilding first and foremost from my home,\u201d says Rodelio, referring to both his family home with Melody and his larger home among his peoples, the Erumanen ne Menuvu. \u201cIndigenous people are peace loving,\u201d he adds. Under the stress of survival threatened by conflict and natural disasters, though, some of the peace traditions have been in danger of disappearing. Rodelio works at reminding his people, \u201cWe have our own ways of doing restorative justice and it\u2019s not just human, but also done in consultation with the Spirits.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Peace studies and practices seem to be woven into every aspect of the college. A weekly one-hour radio show is recorded at the college that always deals with ways to transform conflict. There\u2019s an arts for peace program with theater, music and painting components \u2013 peace-themed posters and paintings line walls everywhere. The college sponsors mixed-ethnic, inter-religion sports programs to foster peace.<\/p>\n<p>Concurrent with its peace emphasis, the college deals with community building through outreach, offering literacy, health, environmental, livelihood, and gender-equality programs.<\/p>\n<p>In one corner of the college campus \u2013 near the main college entrance \u2013 is a building labeled \u201cSaranay Feeds.\u201d This turns out to be a mill that produces animal feeds, a combined agricultural education and income-producing activity, with profits going toward student scholarships.<\/p>\n<h3>In municipal government<\/h3>\n<p>Two of the most surprising interviewees at the conference\u00a0table were not formally associated with the college. <strong>Bartolome <\/strong><strong>B. Lataza Jr<\/strong>. was introduced as the former mayor of the municipality of Alamada (population 56,000) in Cotabato province, along with his former executive secretary, <strong>Arjay <\/strong><strong>Neville L. Repollo<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Lataza started his journey toward peacebuilding as an enlisted man during the martial law period (1972-81) of the Marcos dictatorship. After 22 years of military service, he retired as a major and won Alamada\u2019s mayoral election in 1998.<\/p>\n<p>Alamada was in the grip of \u201cidentity-based conflict\u201d that manifested as spiritual and religious schisms, worsened by environmental degradation. Nearly 80% of the population lived below the official poverty line. \u201cIf we have peace, then there will be development,\u201d Lataza and Repollo decided.<\/p>\n<p>The two gathered representatives from each major group to sit and talk to each other, followed by \u201cthanksgiving meals<em>\u201d <\/em>(<em>Kanduli<\/em>)<em>. <\/em>They found peace themes to reference in the Bible and Quran and indigenous traditions. They let everyone speak freely about their realities, about their victimization. They encouraged all municipal employees to go and \u201clisten to the cries, hear the sentiments of the IDP [internally displaced peoples].\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In 2011 and 2012, Lataza and Repollo attended MPI, taking courses in restorative justice, religion and conflict, trauma healing, peace and justice advocacy, and arts-based peacebuilding.<\/p>\n<p>Today Alamada is a relatively peaceful municipality, where alternative dispute resolution is practiced and governing occurs transparently.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPeople say that investing in peace is expensive,\u201d says former mayor Lataza, who also served multiple terms as city counselor and vice mayor. \u201cBut how much more expensive are war damages to businesses, [are] traumas, [are] thousands of IDPs?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Repollo says he learned that a different kind of power comes from peacebuilding. \u201cYou are more powerful because you are tranquil as a peacebuilder. You can be a lamb in the lion\u2019s den if you are a peacebuilder.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPeacebuilding is a way of life, though it is a way that requires training and experience,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute at age 15<\/strong><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_7086\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7086\" style=\"width: 267px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Jeremy-Simons.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-7086\" src=\"\/\/emu.edu\/now\/is\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Jeremy-Simons-534x400.jpg\" alt=\"Jeremy Simons\" width=\"267\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Jeremy-Simons-534x400.jpg 534w, https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2015\/07\/Jeremy-Simons-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 267px) 100vw, 267px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7086\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeremy Simons, MA &#8217;02, is a regular instructor at MPI.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Catholic Relief Services in Davao physically housed the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute for its first nine years of existence. It ran the annual trainings and provided support services, such as bookkeeping, as well as some funding. Additional funders during most of MPI\u2019s years have been the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development and Mennonite<\/p>\n<p>Central Committee. (MCC continues to offer support by sending participants regularly to MPI\u2019s annual training.)<\/p>\n<p>In 2009, MPI became a free-standing nonprofit, as originally envisioned by its founders, under the direction of <strong>Christine Vertucci<\/strong>. In the following four years, MPI experienced considerable staff turnover and financial challenges.<\/p>\n<p>MPI is now finding its footing again as a peacebuilding institute serving a wide geographical region, attracting the majority of it trainees from outside of the Philippines, says Vertucci.<\/p>\n<p>It also collaborates with other peacebuilding institutes, such as the Peacebuilding and Development Institute in Sri Lanka and the Northeast Asia Regional Peacebuilding Institute. The former institute got its start from former SPI instructor <strong>Mohammed\u00a0Abu-Nimer<\/strong>; one of his students, <strong>Saji Prelis<\/strong>; and <strong>Maharuf<\/strong>, an\u00a0MPI alumnus.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cToday MPI is pointed in three main directions \u2013 (1) education and training, (2) networking, and (3) research and documentation,\u201d Vertucci says. Of these three, she admits that the last is more of an aspiration than an accomplishment. With MPI\u2019s funding largely dependent on fees charged for attending courses, MPI has lacked the budget line to research and document the impact of its trainees over the last 15 years.<\/p>\n<p>Vertucci\u2019s links to MPI go way back. She served on the founding committee of MPI in her previous role as the country representative for MCC. She was an early attender at EMU\u2019s SPI, taking a course in 1996 with <strong>John Paul Lederach <\/strong>to prepare for her MCC work in the Philippines. She returned in 1998 for two courses\u2013 with <strong>Hizkias Assefa <\/strong>on reconciliation and with <strong>Vernon Jantzi <\/strong>on organizational conflict.<\/p>\n<p>Vertucci is not averse to MPI working its way out of a job in the Philippines \u2013 given that its graduates widely replicate MPI\u2019s work on the local level \u2013 but she thinks that day hasn\u2019t yet arrived, not with people from Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Indonesia, Myanmar and so forth (not to mention a number of African countries) still coming for training.<\/p>\n<p>Born of U.S. parents, but raised and permanently settled in the Philippines, <strong>Jeremy Simons, <\/strong>MA \u201902, was a member of MPI\u2019s staff from 2011 to 2013 and continues to teach an MPI course each summer. \u201cMPI has the power to be a convener, having trained so many people,\u201d says Simons. He notes that MPI\u2019s caliber of trainers, with most holding advanced degrees in the peace field, enables it to offer a comprehensive level of training that cannot be matched by other organizations in the Philippines.<\/p>\n<p>He points to unmet needs for MPI\u2019s trainings both within the Philippines and without \u2013 to the need for alternative dispute resolution spread through court systems, restorative disciplinary practices introduced to schools, trauma-healing for almost everyone, much more work with the military and the police on how to be forces for peace rather than violence.<\/p>\n<p>Which leads us back to the observation of former mayor Lataza: the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute just needs to show that it\u2019s <em>much <\/em>more cost-effective for donors to invest in peacebuilding, rather than focusing on fixing the damage emerging from human-made or human-worsened disasters.<\/p>\n<h4 id=\"footnotes\">Footnotes<\/h4>\n<ol>\n<li><small>The eight Filipinos were: two Mindanao bishops, <strong>Abp Ledesma <\/strong>and <strong>Bp Dela Cruz<\/strong>; two Muslim religious leaders, <strong>Alim Elias Macarandas <\/strong>(deceased) and <strong>Alim Julabbi<\/strong>; two Civil Society Organization peace advocates, <strong>Guiamel Alim <\/strong>and <strong>Deng Giguiento<\/strong>; and two Catholic Relief Services staffers, <strong>Myla Leguro <\/strong>and <strong>Peter Rothrock<\/strong>.<\/small><\/li>\n<li><small><strong>Mohammed Abu-Nimer <\/strong>went on to found his own peacebuilding institute at American University in Washington D.C., which ceased functioning in 2013, as described on page 44.<\/small><\/li>\n<li><small>Political and social hurdles remain for this agreement: the Philippine\u00a0Congress must ratify it, followed by a plebiscite of voters in the affected region. A major setback occurred January 25, 2015, when the elite \u201cSpecial\u00a0Action Force\u201d of the Philippine National Police launched an anti-terrorist operation in an area occupied by Muslim rebel groups. The operation was\u00a0interpreted as a broader attack on groups that had agreed to a ceasefire. Fighting ensued. At the end of the day, 44 police and 23 rebels lay dead.\u00a0Despite this, many leaders have urged that the peace process continue.<\/small><\/li>\n<li><small>In addition to its peace focus, Kadtuntaya promotes sustainable livelihoods\u00a0and disaster risk-reduction (necessitated particularly by climate change), including promoting environmentally friendly farming and the\u00a0production of marketable handicrafts.<\/small><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The origins of the first peacebuilding institute in Asia can be traced to a conversation in the home of John Paul and Wendy Lederach when&hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/2015\/07\/mpi-2000-growing-branches-from-a-healthy-tree-trunk\/\" target=\"_self\" class=\"more-link\">Read more <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">about MPI, 2000: Growing Branches from a Healthy Tree Trunk<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":196,"featured_media":7081,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1073],"tags":[1323,1322,1324,835,1320,1317,1318,1319,1321],"issues":[1275],"class_list":["post-7079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-magazine","tag-arjay-neville-l-repollo","tag-bartolome-b-lataza-jr","tag-christine-vertucci","tag-jeremy-simons","tag-melody-ambangan","tag-mindanao-peacebuilding-institute","tag-myla-leguro","tag-rodelio-ambangan","tag-southern-christian-college","issues-2014-15"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/196"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7079"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9893,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7079\/revisions\/9893"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7079"},{"taxonomy":"issues","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issues?post=7079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}