IS THERE HOPE FOR THIS COUNTRY? THE CASE FOR OPTIMISM

BY ANTONIO MELOTO, Executive Director, Gawad Kalinga
2006 Magsaysay Awardee for Community Leadership
Presented at the 2006 Magsaysay Awardees' Lecture Series
Magsaysay Center, Manila, 29 August 2006

As I approached mid-life, I reached a crucial point of reckoning.

What have I done with my life? Did I make a difference in the life of my country and my people? Did I honor God's design that I was born Filipino?

What legacy will I leave to my children? Is it one of honor or disgrace? Will they be safe in raising their own family in the Philippines? Will they be proud to be called Filipino anywhere in the world?

These realities served as backdrop for the above questions.

1. 70% of Filipinos are landless in the countryside, 40% end up as squatters in urban areas.

2. 16% of Filipinos claim they are hungry.

3. Our country, the only Christian nation in Asia (before Timor Leste) is one of the most corrupt in the region according to latest surveys.

As an act of repentance, I decided to do the following:

1. Stop bashing my country.

2. Stop blaming others -- the government for being corrupt, the rich for being selfish, the poor for being lazy.

3. Start to do something positive together with other ordinary Filipinos like myself. This eventually evolved to become Gawad Kalinga which aims to bring the Philippines out of poverty by providing land for the landless, homes for the homeless, food for the hungry -- harnessing the Filipino Bayanihan spirit through multi-sectoral cooperation.

In the beginning the challenge was daunting-- trying to address problems of poverty and squatting that trace their roots to 400 years of feudalism.

I face the question that has been nagging me for years-- How can an ordinary Filipino like myself contribute towards the realization of the dream of our people to rise out of poverty? Traditionally, everyone looks to big business and government for answers. Filipinos see them as so powerful that we have depended on them to lift our country out of poverty and then blame them when they are unable to do so. We fail to recognize that there is just so many of our countrymen we have left behind that big business and government do not have enough power to lift them all up. What can we all do? I cannot answer for big business or government. I am no businessman nor am I in government. Yet I represent the vast majority of Filipinos who also have the power to change this country.

The greatest tragedy that we are experiencing now is that our people have lost their capacity to dream. This is at the root of our poverty. This is not about the poor being hopeless—because they have long learned to cope with hopelessness. What is alarming is the hopelessness that has seeped into the psyche and into the spirit of the rich, the educated and the working middle class. Many of them are leaving and their children are also thinking of leaving. We are losing the critical sector that have the aspirations, the drive and the expertise to lead the majority who do not have the confidence nor the resources to initiate change.

It is imperative that we must have hope. But hope can be like a mirage. There is a very thin line between hope and escapism. Hope can bring people into fantasy. And this is where many Filipinos are -- a new breed who are hooked on telenovelas, Wowowee and Pinoy Big Brother and whose daughters have embraced the Sex Bomb dancers as their icons and their way out of poverty.

Real hope then, must have basis. Hope must be seen. Hope must be felt. Hope must be smelled. Hope must be planted on the ground. Hope is real when squatters become proud landowners, when shanties become decent homes, when the hungry are fed, when streetchildren are healthy and in school.

But hope must begin with me.

I found hope when I found God. In the beginning it was just to seek my personal holiness when I joined Couples for Christ. Later on, I came to realize that I could never be holy if I did not follow Jesus in loving the poor and restoring their dignity as children of God. When we started to build communities in Gawad Kalinga and develop the poor's capacity for self-reliance and self-sufficiency, my journey for personal holiness became a vision of hope for my family, my country and my people.

And my children share my hope.

My 23-year old son, Jay, left his job in L.A. to work for the typhoon victims in Bicol and elsewhere in Luzon. Hope is real to him as it is real to the 40,000 survivor families who will no longer be squatters living in shanties in dangerous areas. They will not remain victims forever.

My eldest daughter, Anna, declined her training in Switzerland and resigned from a job she enjoyed to volunteer in our productivity and food sufficiency program for the poor. She sees hope in the faces of Muslims and Christians in seventeen Muslim communities built by Gawad Kalinga with DSWD and the LGU's in Mindanao so far, overcoming centuries of prejudice and conflict. Anna felt secure enough to visit Datu Paglas in the early months of her pregnancy and sees a lifetime of friendship with the Muslims by trusting a former Muslim commander to be godmother to her first child.

Hope is a powerful force that invites transformation in my children and their co-workers as well as the communities that they hope to change. It can be powerful enough-- for thieves to stop stealing, for the lazy to work-- to transform ugly slums into beautiful communities.

I recall a particular visit to Baseco last December that made me realize the profound value of giving hope to the poor. Upon entering one of the first of nearly a thousand homes we had already built in the area for fire victims, I was overwhelmed by the beautiful interior that I saw -- tiled floors, glass-topped furniture and a fragrant toilet. I remember just a year earlier moving the family from a shanty made of plastic, rusted GI sheets and old wood from the nearby canal. I asked the mother of the house, Malou, who now looked clean and confident, what brought about the dramatic change in such a short time. Instead of telling me that she and her husband are now working and earning, which they are, she simply said “Kasi ginawa mo kaming disente Tito-- binigyan mo kami ng pag-asa.” (You made us decent Tito, you gave us hope.)

In simple language she was telling me a fundamental principle - that economic activities and benefits are natural consequences when the poor start to dream and to work for that dream.

In the same community, no major crime was reported last year among the over 5,000 residents compared to the 28 murders and homicides reported in 2003, the year before we entered the area. Hope does not only trigger productivity, it brings peace. And a decent and peaceful environment provides the right setting for people to dream bigger and work harder.

This is the pattern of development in over 850 communities we are currently building and the 7000 communities that we hope to build by 2010. Change the slum environment for dreams to flourish, attract the convergence of kindred spirits from government organizations, NGO's and ordinary Filipinos here and abroad who love this country and have not given up-- who will pursue change passionately following the path of peace. Ateneo President Father Ben Nebres keeps pushing us to upscale, upscale-- but also provides us support every step of the way as the work gets bigger.

This brings me to a crucial point. The problem of poverty in our country is so massive that our response to it cannot be small. We must ignite hope that is widespread and create a response that is heroic.

To spread hope, we must go to the poor and show them that there is a way out-- we must go to the rich and show them it is not futile to help. We must go to business and government and show them that investing in the poor will be the greatest investment that they can ever make. Because the interest of Gawad Kalinga goes beyond partisan politics and profit, we have no serious difficulty getting the support of business and government. We have gained their trust that our only business is to help build this nation and to bring our people out of poverty.

The response of big business has gone beyond conventional corporate social responsibility. Mr. Manuel Lopez and Meralco have committed to build a school in a Gawad Kalinga community every month. Together with Mr. Lopez, Meralco personnel are seen in GK communities month after month for ground-breaking and turn-over ceremonies. Given this commitment to the education of the poorest of the poor, many in our country are praying for Mr. Lopez to live to be a hundred years.

Aside from building two beautiful GK Villages in Batangas City with a complete program for shelter, education, health and livelihood -- Shell has launched a nationwide campaign to mainstream heroism in support of the partnership with Gawad Kalinga. With “Yan Ang Pinoy” they honor ordinary Filipinos who make a difference in society.

Shell country chairman Ed Chua and Petron Chairman Nick Alcantara are also commendable for rising above business rivalry in the fight of the Philippines against poverty. Philam CEO Joey Cuisia leaves his comfort zone to lead his pack of employees to build their GK village for the Mangyan victims in Bulalacao, Mindoro. He also facilitated the donation of US$ 150,000 of AIG USA for the mudslide victims of Southern Leyte where he once again led a team to build last summer.

There are many others that have come up with innovative and creative support to the call of Gawad Kalinga to spread hope.

But there is just so much to be done. We must build more templates that bring our people out of centuries of landlessness and homelessness and the perennial threat of hunger. We must provide more health services and a kind of education that begins in the home and in the community. We must recover the greatest wealth that we have lost -- our people. Convert our human resource from liability to asset by prioritizing development from bottom up, because nothing much has trickled down from the top.

Just build and they will come. Let us unleash resources for poverty eradication and development that this country has never seen before. A great crisis that has depressed an entire nation must be countered with a great movement that can inspire great heroism.

Last month, I flew to Las Vegas for the Gawad Kalinga Congress to honor the Filipino heroes in the United States. We often herald the sacrifice of OFW's whose concern for loved ones at home has kept our economy afloat. What we are seeing over and above the OFW phenomenon is a new type of altruism where Filipinos from abroad are helping, at great sacrifice, those they are not related to by blood or have any direct obligation to help. Floodgates of support are about to open and we must demand our local counterpart of heroism. This outpouring of generosity from abroad must be matched at home --- love for love-- sacrifice for sacrifice.

We have hit the mother lode of goodwill, of Filipino patriotism, of the deep-seated desire to help our people and our country. Initiatives to help are coming from all over, in many ways and in many forms-- hundreds running the 26-mile marathon in California and Chicago where each runner donates at least 1 house-- some giving up their luxury cars and jewelry to help the poor in the towns they left behind-- UST doctors working extra hours to fund their villages-- alumni from Ateneo, La Salle, UP, San Beda, College of the Holy Spirit, Assumption, St. Scholastica's, Miriam, St. Theresa's, PNU, PWU and FEU -- every one of them adopting a poor community and outdoing each other in a race to save the country they have not stopped loving.

Even the young, many of whom were born in the US, have started to reconnect with their ethnic roots in a dramatic and heroic way-- giving up debuts and proms to help the poor that they do not know-- even taking a leave from good jobs to volunteer for a year in the Philippines.

The heroism of Fil-ams is being matched by Filipinos in Canada. Wherever I went last May -- Winnipeg, Toronto, Montreal -- our countrymen were dancing to the beat of a new found hope in the country of their birth. Even Joey Albert, a long-time resident of Vancouver, regained her Filipino citizenship and was singing her love song for the Philippines all over Canada. The concern was so intense and massive, particularly for the mudslide victims of Southern Leyte, that they were able to raise CAN $450,000 - including CAN $300,000 contributed by the governments of Ontario and Alberta - in the short time I was there. The help from Ontario was made possible through the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration who was impressed with the Gawad Kalinga communities built by the sacrifice and heroism of ordinary Filipinos. When a people start to care for others beyond self-interest, he starts to regain his honor and the respect and trust of the world.

It was the same spirit I witnessed in Australia the week after I left Montreal. The Speaker of Parliament of New South Wales, Hon. John Aquilina, fired up the Filipinos in Sydney when he said that his visit to the Australian GK Village in Payatas last February was one of his most profound experience in recent years. He came to the Philippines because he was curious about this new passion of his Filipino constituents and he was touched. Just build and they will come. Last week, Gawad Kalinga ANCOP was registered in Australia as a tax-exempt foundation as it is also in the US and Canada. We hope to register it as well in the Middle East and European countries where Filipinos are giving generously for the poor in the Philippines when they themselves have very real needs for their families.

Many have said that we are a divided people and in many ways we are. But in loving the motherland, in helping the poor and the weak, the hearts of Filipinos are one. We are one in our desire to see our country rise from poverty and our people from shame.

I am not embarrassed to admit that my greatest dream is to make Gawad Kalinga the 8th Wonder of the World, built by the Bayanihan spirit of our people who are no longer slaves of the past. This is my legacy to my children and to the young Filipinos everywhere. I want them to be a new generation of Filipinos who are proud of their country. And I know you will all help because this is your dream for your children as well.

The quest of every Filipino is honor, to be anywhere in this world and not be ashamed that millions of his countrymen suffer from poverty, corruption and hunger. It is a necessary quest, for without honor, we will forever hang our heads in shame.

What started out as a national effort to lift the poor out of poverty and build a nation we can all be proud of is emerging to be a global movement for Filipinos all over the world. And because its attractiveness as a universal template for poverty intervention and conflict resolution is reaching non-Filipinos as well, Gawad Kalinga is gaining more sympathy and support worldwide. We have a real opportunity to build a global brand and attract unimaginable resources to our shores at this time when the world's highest agenda is poverty reduction.

We have with us the natural leaders of an initiative that will raise the image of Filipinos from Third World to one that many other countries will follow in order to confront and defeat poverty in their own respective homelands. It is in the hands of Filipinos privileged by wealth or talent to take leadership positions, but they can do so only if they have the hearts of heroes.

It is only heroes who will extend their power and resources to help others beyond themselves. It is only heroes who can rescue a failing nation and a suffering people. It is only the hero in you that I appeal to, that our people cry out for.

Be a hero. Don't forget those who have been left behind. Think of the poor in the towns and cities where you come from. Don't stop hoping for them and your country. Demand greatness and generosity from yourselves and inspire them in others.

Begin the journey to our promised land with hope. Take the path of heroism and claim honor as our prize.

I thank God for His perfect design that I was born Filipino. God bless the Philippines.