The pandemic has made the political transition in the two-year-old autonomous region even more fragile as skirmishes between government forces and extremist groups, inter-clan disputes and conflicts over land, sent thousands of residents to evacuation centers where observing minimum health protocols such as physical distancing, washing of hands with soap and wearing of face masks, is a major challenge.

Listen to the podcast edition of this episode from our Reporting Mindanao series, in partnership with Internews, on ‘COVID, Conflicts and the Peace Process’ which will focus on what is happening in South Upi, Maguindanao.

Featuring excerpts from the Feb. 6 web forum with guests Dr. Jowel Canuday, Froilyn Mendoza, Edward Abelardo, and Naguib Sinarimbo. The full web forum video can be viewed here. 

For a full copy of the web forum, e-mail [email protected]. Presentations are available by request via [email protected].

Editor-in-Chief: Carolyn Arguillas

Executive Producer: Amalia Cabusao

Video producer: Ferdinand Cabrera

Technical staff: Rob Gumba and Yas D. Ocampo

Listen to the message of Davao Archbishop Emeritus Fernando Capalla, chair of the Bishops-Ulama Conference, on the Mindanao Week of Peace 2020, which runs from November 26 to December 2. This year's theme is "Dialogue Towards Harmony."

Welcome back to Reporting Mindanao, an online forum initiated by MindaNews to discuss various concerns in Mindanao and to provide journalists a venue to enhance their understanding and reporting of these issues. This episode is the podcast version of the web forum held last November 16, 2020

For this edition, we are launching our Monitoring in Marawi Series, with “Voices from Marawi” because that is what the 127-page report of the Bangsamoro Parliament’s Special Committee on Marawi will share with us: voices from Marawi still crying for attention 37 months after President Rodrigo Duterte declared Marawi “liberated from the terrorist influence.”

Executive Producer: Amalia Cabusao

Technical Director and Web Forum Production: Rob Gumba, Jr.

Podcast Production: Yas D. Ocampo

Photo: Manman Dejeto

Editor-in-Chief: Carolyn Arguillas

Special thanks to MP Anna Tarhata Basman

You’re listening to the second part of the Bangsamoro in Transition series of Reporting Mindanao. This podcast edition examines the progress of the Normalization track of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao as mandated by  Republic Act 11054, the enabling law of the 2014 peace agreement.

How many combatants and weapons of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front have been decommissioned since the Bangsamoro Government was inaugurated in March 2019?  How many more are to be decommissioned before June 30, 2022, at the end of the transition period?

Normalization, however, is not just about decommissioning the MILF’s weapons and combatants. It is much more than this. Let’s find out in this second part of the presentation of the  Bangsamoro Midterm Review conducted by the Mindanao Peoples Caucus.

You are listening to Reporting Mindanao, an online media forum initiated by MindaNews to discuss various concerns in Mindanao and to provide journalists a venue to enhance their understanding and reporting of these issues.   We begin our Bangsamoro in Transition series with a two-part session on the mid-term review conducted by the Mindanao Peoples Caucus on the three-year transition of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.   What have the  Bangsamoro transition government and the national government accomplished under Republic Act 11054, the enabling law of the 2014 peace agreement.  What have they failed to do and why?   Let's find out! This is an audio edition of  the October 29 , 2020 forum on the Legal and Political track of the Bangsamoro transition.  The second session is on the Normalization track. 

Related stories: 

Mid-term review recommends extension of Bangsamoro transition until June 2025

Special development fund for Bangsamoro: only 2.5-B out of 10-B released

For this edition, let us remember Fr. Teresito "Chito" Soganub, martyr of inter-religious dialogue, who survived 117 days as hostage of violent extremists in Marawi  City in 2017. The Vicar-General of the Prelature of Marawi spent 23 years in the country’s lone Islamic city. After his escape from his captors,Fr. Chito was not given any pastoral assignment to allow him to undergo trauma healing. He died in his sleep early morning of July 22, 2020 in their ancestral home in Norala, South Cotabato.

Related stories:

Peacebuilders reminisce the legacy of Fr. Chito Soganub 

Fr. Chito Soganub, Marawi siege survivor, laid to rest 

Fr. Chito Soganub: interfaith dialogue martyr, Marawi hostage survivor, dies in his sleep 

For this edition, we broadcast the full audio recording of the online press conference in Davao City on August 3, 2020 on the filing of a petition via registered mail and e-mail to ask the Supreme Court to declare the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020 unconstitutional. According to the Mindanawon petitioners--a Moro leader, a human rights worker and three journalists — and an organization catering to the education of Indigenous Peoples or Lumads, a law with no regard for human rights cannot defeat terrorism.

Related story by Carolyn Arguillas: https://www.mindanews.com/top-stories/2020/08/mindanawons-ask-sc-to-declare-anti-terror-act-unconstitutional-law-with-no-regard-for-human-rights-they-say-cant-defeat-terrorism/