The Aquino Foundation

The Benigno S. Aquino Foundation was established by Mrs. Corazon Cojuangco Aquino in 1985 in honor of her late husband who was murdered in 1983 by the martial law regime that ruled the Philippines from 1972 to 1986. The work of the Aquino Foundation in peace and human rights education began in 1997 with the development and implementation of human rights training programs for educators and trainers of the Philippine National Police. This focus on peace and human rights is a reflection of the commitment of the late Senator Benigno "Ninoy” Aquino and former President Aquino to human rights and the peaceful resolution of conflict.

Ninoy Aquino firmly believed in pursuing peace through dialogue. Cory Aquino made human rights the central theme of her campaign when she challenged the dictator, Ferdinand Marcos, for the presidency. And once she was president, one of her first acts was to require the teaching of human rights on all levels in all schools in the country, and to the entire government bureaucracy, including the police and the military.

Since its inception, IPPD’s Peace and Human Rights Desk has been involved in human rights activities within the ASEAN region, including a citizens’ initiative to set up human rights commissions in ASEAN countries and a Human Rights Mechanism for ASEAN, as well as the promotion of human rights reporting in the region. But the re-education and civilianization of the police remains a major concern of IPPD. We remain committed to seeing the Philippine Public Safety College (PPSC) achieve its goal to civilianize its approach to the training and education of our police and other public safety officers.

However, our past work with the PPSC has taken a heavy toll – emotionally and physically – on our training partners, which prompted us to look for ways of promoting peace and human rights values in other sectors of Philippine society. In particular, IPPD is looking into filling the gaps in the promotion of peace and human rights through inter-societal dialogue, and the infusion of concepts of good governance in our formal and informal systems of education.

While directly training the police in peace and human rights values and concepts is a stop-gap measure, our work with educators in the school system and the public safety sector, as well as development workers, is a long-term investment in the development of the next generation of Filipino citizens and leaders. The following are the past, present and future programs on peace, tolerance and human rights education of the IPPD:

1. Building the culture of peace and human rights

This is a series of regional live-in seminars for academic personnel (instructors, training specialists, and education program specialists) of the Philippine Public Safety College and human resource, training and community relations officers of public safety agencies.

From 1997 to 1999, the project trained a pool of over 200 PPSC instructors, administrators and training personnel of the Philippine National Police (PNP), the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) and the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) on how to integrate the culture of peace and human rights in the public safety sector.

The training modules were gender sensitive, multi-cultural, inter-religious and multi-lingual. They integrated peaceful methodologies that maximized participation, critical thinking and reflection and employed creative learning instruments such as case studies, workshops, film showing, biography work, role-play, body movements/Qi Gong, and storytelling.

The instructors at the PPSC and trainers of the PNP, the BJMP and BFP were taught how to integrate into their lesson plans and training designs, the culture of peace and human rights. This way, we hoped to develop public safety officers ingrained in the principles and values of peace building and human rights protection. In October 1998, the PNP commissioned IPPD to hold a special seminar-workshop on Building the Culture of Peace and Human Rights for 28 Chiefs of Police in the Metro Manila area. The idea was to give them the values and skills to make their police stations human rights friendly.

Based on its experience in training some 200 police and other public safety officers on Building the Culture of Peace and Human Rights, IPPD brought up to the PNP hierarchy the concerns of the officer corps, such as the absence of vital support systems for their psycho-social, legal and professional needs. With the Directorate for Human Resources and Doctrine Development of the PNP, IPPD invited a group of psychologists, counselors, academics and NGO workers to discuss how the community can help the PNP to establish such services and structures.

2. Faculty Development and Capability Building

An off-shot of the regional training seminars conducted by IPPD, the Faculty Development and Capability Building Training Course Towards the Development of a Civilianized Culture and Values of Professionalism in the Public Safety Services is currently being undertaken by the PPSC and the Philippine Normal University, with technical assistance from the Peace and Human Rights Desk of IPPD. The five-part program includes: needs assessment, curricular review, instructional materials development, piloting and evaluation of the modules, and implementation.

The program is ready for pilot testing. The course will train the instructor corps of the PPSC in its new orientation towards civilianization and community policing. Besides concepts of peace and human rights, the course will ensure a well-rounded knowledge of the culture and environment that policemen operate in.

3. Civil Society Dialogue on the Power of Language

The Civil Society Dialogue on the Power of Language held in July 2001, was an experimental activity spurred by the civil strife led by the urban poor of Metro Manila against the government last May which highlighted the socio-economic and political divisions in Philippine society. The massive street protests undertaken by the dispossessed classes confused and upset even those in civil socierty who had been working closely with them through the years. Clearly, there was among the sectors of Philippine society, a gap in understanding one another.

The participants were an eclectic mix of civil society members representing the church, the youth, the urban poor, the human rights community, professionals, the indigenous peoples, the media, the labor sector, the elderly, the women, and the academics who were invited as individuals representing themselves and not their organizations. This made a great difference in the quality of their participation and the direction of the discussion. What transpired was a kind of retreat where our participants stopped and reflected on their beliefs, their lives and their work and began to see these from a different perspective.

We found that genuine dialogue is possible among people of good will when they leave their prejudices at the door and relate as individuals, instead of members of political or ideological groups. Based on this experience, the Aquino Foundation through IPPD, will undertake the role of facilitator of societal dialogues, especially among sectors in conflict such as capital and labor, students and school administrators, etc. The Center will not facilitate the actual resolution of the conflict, but establish dialogue among the parties that are conflict ridden, with language as the starting point.

4. Citizenship and Leadership for Good Governance

As part of IPPD’s thrust to transform Philippine society through peace and human rights education, it entered into a partnership with Philippine Normal College to pursue a series of seminar-workshops for educators and heads of educational institutions on Citizenship and Leadership for Good Governance. The activity aims to provide participants with the knowledge and skills to implement "Project Citizen” in their schools and classrooms. Project Citizen is designed to get students involved in the workings of their communities by requiring them to do active research on aspects of community life as a course requirement.

5. Peace through Self-Empowerment

For implementation in 2002 is a program to train and organize full time peace workers committed to educate, organize and participate in the peaceful resolution of conflict in selected pilot areas in the country. The peace workers will be equipped with skills, knowledge and consciousness on the spiritual and practical aspects of peace promotion based on the values of love, inner peace and unity. The course curriculum will be based on the seven dimensions of life (spirit, mind and personality, physical relationships, work, play and the world) to make the peace worker whole — spiritually, emotionally, mentally and physically — and thus be able to share wholeness with the community.

Index: Podium

Intergroup Relations Programs: How Effective Are They?
by Walter G. Stephan & Cookie White Stephan

4th Annual Network Conference
by Michael Seberich

Presentation of the "Power of Language" - Handbook at the Council of Europe
by Viola Georgi

Empowerment and Human Security in a time of transition - impressions from a visit in South Africa
by Katrin Uhl

The Aquino Foundation

Evaluation of Education for Democracy and Tolerance
by Gabriele Ketterle