Engaging the youh

Samira Ali Gutoc .

MARAWI City–To combat terrorism and to ensure there will be no more siege, we have to inspire the youth in concrete activities. They are after all the majority population in a youth bulge phenomenon where more are born into a family especially in a society with low reproductive health education and a culture that encourages more children.

Engaging the youth (15-21 years old which were the ages of most of the Maute Group members) into purposive, deliberated, transparent, participatory activities for the youth is a strategy for peace building and preventing violent extremism (PVE).

Such programs for the youth, by the youth and of the youth inspire them so they do not feel they do not have a place in society. Powerpoint lectures on youth development have been shared to the Provincial Youth Office through Board Member SK Federation Chair Jamir Adiong.

Youth leadership is mandated by law based on the Constitution, the highest law of the land that grants one special paragraph for youth development. It is thus a responsibility of the state.

Throughout the 15 months of the siege, Iligan Muslim students Association (Imsa) and the psycho-social teams of Ranao Rescue Team and partner groups led by Camal Sharief of Inspired Young Optimists Guild have been mobilizing motivational seminars in Toril through pancake-making, leadership and Islam sermons, etc.

Sharief moved to Malabang where some evacuees relocated along with other leaders like Imsa’s Jamal Baulo. They have each organized their respective activities in the field. Sharief assisted the Catholic Church here in implementing an Opapp-supported Youth Leadership Summit. Such YLS have also been regularly convened by the various battalions over the past years in Lanao del Sur where we had lectured in Malabang, which is near Tubaran town where air strikes hit so-called anti-state groups and elsewhere.

Check out the National Youth Commission FB page for opportunities and Armm for scholarships, also check out Philippine National Police and Philippine Military Academy websites for entrance examinations for those who want to enter the security sector.

(Samira Ali Gutoc-Tomawis, Ll.B., co-founder of the Young Moro Professionals resigned as Commissioner of the Bangsamoro Transition Commission in late May, days after the Marawi Crisis started, citing personal reasons and policy questions. She is one of the organizers of the Ranao Rescue Team, a group set up to respond to the crisis. She had earlier served as an assemblywoman, women sector, of the Regional Legislative Assembly, Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao; was former director, Al-Amanah Islamic Bank Inc. and former director of the Marawi Resort Hotel Inc.)