Bishop says RP needs more than elections to shed culture of impunity

By Charlie Señase
Inquirer Mindanao
First Posted 15:52:00 11/26/2009

COTABATO CITY, Philippines. A leader of the Catholic church in Mindanao on Thursday lamented the "culture of impunity" as a deep-seated obstacle to peaceful co-existence of the island's inhabitants that changing of leaders through the ballots would not possibly change the landscape of fear and violence.

Cotabato Archbishop Orlando Quevedo cited the Maguindanao massacre in reminding authorities and the public that the culture of impunity "has indeed grown through the years."

"Political administrations of officials in all parties from the 1960s to the present have cultivated and exploited to their own advantage (the culture of impunity)," Quevedo said in a statement.

He said this was the reason why he believed that "elections have not and will not change the situation."

Describing the carnage as a "conscienceless crime that cries out to heaven," the Cotabato prelate has urged the Arroyo government to enforce the law against the people responsible "without fear or favor."

He called on Malacañang "to use all its powers and decisively act to identify and arrest the perpetrators and apply the full-force of the law."

Praying for the souls of the victims and asking for divine consolation, comfort and strength to their families, he turned to confront politicians and non-politicians for their quick finger-pointing over Monday's tragedy.

"This is only partly right and has conveniently absolved us from any culpability. But, my sense of history leads me to believe that somehow we all share the blame to a certain extent," he explained.

Quevedo noted that "a social structure of traditional leadership that was meant to be for the good of the people was not so with powerful political families failing to change this culture of political convenience, allowing the culture of impunity to endure through successive administrations."

To resolve the perennial problem, he strongly proposed for a radical inner change.

"We need to change from the bottom up, from individuals to families, from families to communities. We need change of values that tolerate evil or choose the lesser evil. We need to learn new values that will transform our cultures from within," the former president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), said.

Quevedo also called on Catholics and Muslims "to faithfully and correctly follow" their respective holy books—the Bible and the Koran as a guide to acquire true value transformation.

"Indeed, we must condemn, we must demand decisive action for justice, and we must pray that we also must believe to change with the grace of God, we can," he said.