Monday, January 6, 2014

MILF: Moros and non-Moros in Lanao Norte stress the need to resolve ‘rido’ under Bangsamoro

Posted to the MILF Website (Jan 6): Moros and non-Moros in Lanao Norte stress the need to resolve ‘rido’ under Bangsamoro



The ambush of former Mayor Abdul Malik Manamparan of Nunungan town in Lanao del Norte while returning home from a campaign sortie during last year’s mid-term elections that killed 12 people and wounding 8 is  one of the country’s worst poll-related violence incidents in 2013.
  
The incident was still fresh in the minds of Lanao del Norte residents when they were asked how they would want the future Bangsamoro government to matter in their lives, whether they became its constituents or not.

In a public consultation on the Bangsamoro Basic Law last month, Moro and non-Moro people alike said the new autonomous entity should address the lingering problem of rido or family feud in many of the communities in the province. “Rido” as locally known among Maranaos and Maguindanaons is also prevalent in other provinces of ARMM as well as in the province of North Cotabato.

In a report by journalist Ryan Rosauro of the Philippine Daily Inquirer on January 4, he said that, “The meetings, in 13 clusters and conducted by the Lanao Peace Partnership on behalf of the Bangsamoro Transition Commission with the support from the GIZ Civil Peace Service, solicited grass-roots ideas that should be part of the charter of the Bangsamoro government. These attracted over a thousand people in 21 of the 22 towns and in 44 barangays of Iligan City”.

Rosauro quoted Gimaidee Ann Cadotdot of Pailig Academy for Grassroots Democracy who said that, “rido was the most common concern that cropped up during the consultations, even surpassing the issue of poverty”.

Based on discussions of the community experiences, the unresolved enmities weighed down economic development efforts.  The participants in the consultation stressed that because of rido, many croplands had been left idle, as farmers are forced to evacuate. They didn’t feel they were safe from being targets of revenge attacks by feuding groups. To avoid further conflict warring families were resulting to selling their valuable lands and other properties to raise funds for blood money.

They stressed that much of the rido-related violent incidents had occurred in their communities, especially those in centers of trading activities.  

While rido or its equivalent has been observed in other parts of the country, academician Abhoud Syed Lingga of the Institute for Bangsamoro Studies and member of the MILF Peace Panel said it was more pronounced in Moro communities, Rosauro quoted him saying.



Rido is related to the Moro people’s deep sense of personal pride and honor, what is referred to in Maranao and Maguindanaon as “maratabat.” If this sense of honor is violated, parties can engage in fits of violence to assuage the psychological hurt, said Rosauro in his report..

A 2005 study commissioned by the Asia Foundation showed that a feud could start even from minor matters. Those that turn bloody and protracted arise from disputes over land and political rivalry.

Rarely are the cases related to litigations in civil courts, which are still culturally alien to many ordinary Moros.

Rather, these trigger a cycle of vengeful attacks that stop only when settled, usually by traditional leaders wielding influence over the protagonists.

Asked to suggest measures to deal with rido, the participants in the public consultation meetings from communities where the presence of Moro rebels is strong, hoped the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) would rein in its forces from joining revenge attacks.

Most MILF forces, they observed, had a hard time keeping distance from the rido of relatives. Another suggestion was to expand the coverage of the Shari’ah justice system to include criminal cases.

According to former Moro rebel leader Lacsamana Mutia, prescribing degrees of punishment under a justice system consistent with their cultural moorings would serve as deterrents to Muslim Bangsamoro constituents from committing acts of violence against other persons.

Still another idea was to build the capacity of governance structures—from the barangay up—to undertake dialogues. If the parties are brought into a dialogue to thresh out differences, rido may be arrested, the participants said.

The future Bangsamoro political entity is expected to feature “a plural system for the administration of justice,” as characterized by the government’s chief negotiator, Miriam Coronel-Ferrer, in peace talks with the MILF. Ferrer is a political science professor of the University of the Philippines.

http://www.luwaran.com/index.php/welcome/item/755-moros-and-non-moros-in-lanao-norte-stress-the-need-to-resolve-‘rido’-under-bangsamoro

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