They will bounce back better

Don Mustapha
Loong

Conclusion

I ADMIT I have not yet arrived at a very logical answer to my decades old question. The 80/20 statistics that I get to notice subliminally the past years.

If there are 100 new Moro lawyers, chances are there are 80 new Maranao lawyers and the 20 is shared among the Maguindanao, Tausug, Yakan and Sama.

If there are 100 Moro Career Executive Service Officers in the country, chances are there are 80 Maranao CESOs and the 20 is shared amongst the rest of the tribes.

If there are 100 Moro scholars abroad for Masters degrees in the past few years, chances are 80 percent are from the people of the lake.

If there are 100 Moro UP graduates, 80 are from Lanao.

If there are 100 Moro high ranking officials in the country composed of National Secretaries, undersecretaries, regional directors, Ambassadors, career appointees, chances are 80 percent are from the lake.

If there are 100 prosperous Moro businessmen in Metro Manila, chances are 80 percent are from the lake.

If there are 100 people of the lake, chances are 80 percent have a certain kind of capacity either for academic excellence, or business or politics.

Statistically, if there are 100 islanders, only 20 percent are at an advantage while the 80 percent are in a marginalized state of capacity.

I am not analyzing this to compete. I am thinking of it like a pizza. That all can have eight slices of pizza each. It is just important to deconstruct the secret of the people of the lake and find a way to infuse it to the islands and the plains — at least that yearning for improved capacity, that natural inclination to optimize network, that inherent tendency for strategic thinking and the deep foundation in faith as a general rule.

Because I believe the greatest poverty that keeps the Moro poor is not the absence of houses or cars or malls – but the absence of capacity – in the sense that the total potential to be the best that they can be is not optimized.

But then, the people of the lake have shown us. That a people isolated by the high altitude of the lake can prosper in any community all over the country – by the sheer trinity of faith, capacity and acumen.

If you look at it, possibly a small percentage of the people of Lanao are in Marawi. The overwhelming majority have conquered the country’s central business districts, the nation’s summer capitals, the country’s prime tourism destinations, the country’s prime malls and the most numerous and distant communities in the heart of many of the country’s cities and provinces.

The majority, who are now business moguls, career professionals, influential politicians and power broker networks, will not allow their hometown to remain ravaged. They will use their advantage of capacity — to rebuild Marawi to a better state than before.

Allah has reasons wherein no mortal can question his infinite wisdom. In the first night of the siege, my cousin and childhood friend  was one of the seven who died with their team of nine Army soldiers as they secured the home of the Marawi Mayor. They were overrun and surrounded. I went to my uncle to console him for the loss of his son whose body could not be retrieved in the middle of the war zone for three days.

He said, “This is Qadar. It is Allah’s will. We cannot question the will of Allah.”

Maybe something better awaits Marawi after this very sad event. Insha Allah.

The long lasting effect of the Marawi siege will remain in the minds and hearts of the Filipino people, especially the people of Marawi.

As of now, we can only forecast and guess. But my guess is that Marawi will bounce back stronger.

The 80% highly capable people of the lake, all over the country and the world, will ensure that Marawi will be built back better — now. Insha Allah.

(Engr. Don Mustapha A. Loong, a Tausug native of Sulu is currently the Regional Secretary of the Department of Public Works and Highways in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. He was former Provincial Administrator of Sulu and one of the first Moro Civil Engineers of UP Diliman. He was recently conferred a National Achievement Award by the University of the Philippines College of Engineering where he graduated. As a student, Loong served as president of the UP Muslim Students Association in UP Diliman, was part of the Muslim Youth and Student Alliance and was a convenor of the Young Moro Professionals Network. He is also a recipient of various fellowships — in the United Kingdom, United States and Africa, and is one of the founding directors of the Bangsamoro Executives and Leaders League.)