DAVAO CITY—Four international personalities of the World Forum for Democratization in Asia (WFDA) will arrive in Davao City on Sunday, August 24, for a Solidarity Mission to Mindanao from August 25-30 which is co-organized by the Initiatives for International Dialogue (IID) and Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC)-Southeast Asia.
DAVAO CITY—Four international personalities of the World Forum for Democratization in Asia (WFDA) will arrive in Davao City on Sunday, August 24, for a Solidarity Mission to Mindanao from August 25-30 which is co-organized by the Initiatives for International Dialogue (IID) and Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC)-Southeast Asia.
Dr. Paul Scott, Zanaa Jurmed, Bo Tedards, and Sarwar Bari will visit Sulu, Zamboanga, North Cotabato, Maguindanao, and the Lanao Provinces to support peace-building efforts in conflict-affected areas in Mindanao.
Scott, is a professor of Modern Chinese and Japanese history in Kansai Gaidai University in Osaka, Japan and also a member of the steering committee of the Alliance for Reform and Democracy in Asia (ARDA).
Jurmed is a veteran women’s activist in Mongolia and both director of the Center for Citizens Alliance and CEDAW Watch Network Center and also the chairperson of the Mongolian Women’s NGO Association. She was awarded with a Polar Star by the President of Mongolia for championing women’s rights in her country.
Tedards is the coordinator of WFDA and director of International Cooperation of the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy. WFDA is an international network and platform of democracy advocates in the region. It is a forum committed to promoting and advancing the merits of democracy as a universal value and fundamental right to which all citizens and peoples in Asia are entitled which is indispensable for sustainable peace and development.
Bari is the national coordinator of the Pattan Development Organization, and secretary-general of the Free and Fair Election-Network (FAFEN). Pattan works for improved local governance which starts from transparency and democratic norms in community level institutions and also involved fostering better links and cooperation between communities and line departments.
The Mindanao Solidarity Mission aims to contribute to the needed international response and attention to the peace situation in Mindanao, gather suggestions on how WFDA as a network can contribute/assist civil society organizations to strengthen democratic institutions in the country and sustain engagement in the peace process in Mindanao; and strengthen international solidarity for Mindanao
Ma. Carmen Lauzon-Gatmaytan, IID program coordinator, said the mission is timely given the situation Mindanao is facing today.
“We are caught in the situation where people needs to deeply understand why the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral (MOA-AD) was stalled and the skirmishes going on as a result of the very complex Mindanao reality,” Lauzon-Gatmaytan said.
The Solidarity Mission to Mindanao, she said, will reinforce the ongoing peace-building initiatives in the region given the extensive experience of WFDA in focusing the attention of the Asian peoples on the democratization process in the region and to encourage their participation in it.
One of WFDA’s identified country-specific focus areas is the Philippines. With entrenched inequality and continuous human rights violations, the Philippines is experiencing a grave political crisis, and the risk of further instability, and even reversal, of Philippine democracy is significant.
The group will meet with local government executives, the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), ceasefire monitoring mechanisms in Cotabato, civil society groups, and members of the zones for peace in North Cotabato. They will also engaged the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process (OPAPP) and the Mindanao Economic Development Council (MEDCo).
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