Sending women to accomplish dangerous missions is a traditional practice in many communities. Sometime in the 1980s, in Sagada, Mt. Province, women were sent out to negotiate the retrieval of dead bodies killed in a shootout between the military and the New People’s Army. The decomposing bodies threatened the sanitation of the river, and there was no time to wait for the fighting to stop. In the 1970s, a group of Kalinga women bared their chests before the engineers of the National Power Corporation and the soldiers of the Philippine military to express their opposition to the Chico River Dam.

Time and again, in Maguindanao and Maranao societies, women would be sent to explore the ground for negotiations that would settle a festering dispute between families.

Why send the women? The logic in doing so exploits the duality of what women are and how they are perceived in most societies. On the one hand, many women possess the inner strength that has helped them cope with life circumstances that are often not under their control but are in the hands of men (fathers, husbands, religious, civic and government authorities). Thus, there will always be brave women willing to take on such dangerous missions when called upon, especially if it would mean saving lives and averting more serious harm.

At the same time, men commonly perceive the women as vulnerable and weak. Women do not traditionally carry the weapons – the men do. They fulfill the non-transferable function of reproducing life, which is necessary for the survival of the race. They are cared for and protected, along with the children. It would be a shame for the men to kill them. And when they bare their chests – a practice done not so much in Islamized communities but in other indigenous communities in the Philippines and countries like Colombia -- it is to humiliate the men for their arrogance.

When Vice-Mayor Esmael Mangudadatu sent his wife, Genalyn and sisters Eden and Farina to accomplish something he cannot do himself because of the death threats against him, he was tapping into this age-old practice of sending women as emissaries. This being the modern time, the purpose was election-related: to file his candidacy for the post of Maguindanao governor. For good measure, he threw in a pack of journalists to cover the event. And to argue their case, two women lawyers were invited to help out. This is, after all, the epoch when the press plays the role of broadcasting events to the greater public, and when journalists, lawyers, candidate, and citizens were protected by laws on press freedom, human rights and elections.

The Mangudadatus thought the formula for non-violent action in an undoubtedly crowded and messy election would be met with restraint. But the act of defiance against their political rival Andal Ampatuan, Jr., was met with the exact opposite.

The ruthlessness in the premeditated plan to obliterate the Mangudadatus from the election scene come May 2010; the crassness with which the convoy was shot at, bodies and vans altogether shoved in newly dug earth; and the utter carelessness as to who gets killed, clan member or not, convoy-rider or passerby, journalist or lawyer, pregnant woman, or whatnot have defied all laws and norms – customary or modern, God-given or human-made, domestic or international, religious or secular.

Yet it has happened, in the here and now, in this blighted country.

I have asked this question a few months ago, in another piece, and I ask them again in pain, how, how did we become a country of killers?

***

While killings have been going on all over the country, there are specific circumstances that made Maguindanao the site of this abominable carnage that to date counts almost 60 people killed in one incident, among them 27 journalists, two lawyers, and more than 20 women.

Maguindanao is the home base of the Ampatuans, the ruling clan in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. Eight years of entrenching themselves in provincial and regional politics have made them the most armed, the most powerfully connected, and probably the richest clan in Moroland. After delivering a 12-0 victory for the administration’s senatorial slate in 2007 and shaving off the popular Fernando Po Jr. votes’ in favor of GMA in the 2004 presidential election, they have earned the eternal affection of the president and her allies.

With government resources, they have armed large numbers of civilians. They have commandeered the loyalty of the provincial and regional police and auxiliary forces to themselves. These forces refused to give security to the Mangudadadatus and were apparently involved in the blockade, making the whole Maguindanao officialdom, and maybe even the regional government, directly involved.

Add to the armory of government-issued firearms the family stockpile of high-powered firearms, easily amassed from the wealth accrued from years in public office. Many of these guns are most likely unregistered (the government’s amnesty for unlicensed firearms that ended October 31 was a total failure; even less arms than were previously accounted for were registered).

A scion of a family enjoying such connections and privileges would find it hard not to be drunk with power and the arrogance of one above the law. Indeed, on the same day as Genalyn was slapped, stabbed and shot and the rest of the convoy hogtied and forced to march to their deaths, the brother of the main suspect was in Malacañang meeting with the president’s party men and forging electoral deals!

Malacañang may be several islands removed from the scene of the crime. But it was no less the occupants of the Palace who pampered the clan with lethal weapons and corrupted power. It was Malacañang who enabled the Ampatuans to build their domain in a volatile terrain viciously contested by competitive clans who feel deprived of their fair share of the spoils.

The people and the rest of the world are watching the national government take decisive action against its most powerful ally. They see through the lame excuses of government spokespersons and the empty, symbolic motions of mourning of a government leadership haunted by the monsters it created.

***

Convicting the mastermind and disbanding the Ampatuan fiefdom is one important step to halt the impunity enjoyed by the ruling clan. But no other clan, even the aggrieved Mangudadatus, should be allowed to entrench themselves in turn. ALL unlicensed firearms should be seized. ALL private armies, the CAFGUS and CVOs under the command of local governments disbanded. An anti-dynasty law should also be passed now to prevent this winner-take-all mentality of political families. Serious consideration by the Congress and COMELEC should be made to hold the election in the ARMM in advance. More on these proposed measures next column.

E-mail: mcf178@yahoo.com