Full circle for RP-Arab ties - FROM A DISTANCE by Carmen N. Pedrosa

Last week Saudi Ambassador to the Philippines Saleh Al-Ghamdi received an honorary doctorate in humanities from the Mindanao State University for his tireless work to bring peace and mutual cooperation between the two countries. For those who have followed closely the work of Ambassador Al-Ghamdi, the honor given to him is well deserved. In the short time that he has been in the Philippines he has opened new paths of cooperation between our two countries in trade, politics and culture. An enthusiastic audience of thousands of Christians and Muslims, led by CHED Commissioner Manuel D. Punzal and the university President Camar Umpa, applauded him as he urged them to persevere with the effort to put Mindanao firmly on the path of peace and development. The honor given to Ambassador Al-Ghamdi by Mindanao State University is unprecedented. He is the first foreign ambassador to receive an honorary doctorate from the university.

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Ambassador Al-Ghamdi told the audience that his government has a special attachment to the university because it houses the King Faisal Center for Islamic and Arabic Studies and the King Faisal Mosque. The university is well-regarded for providing quality education to Muslims and the people of Mindanao in all fields for the last 40 years. It was specially touching that he acknowledged that many MSU graduates were involved in the development of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia so that it could rightly be said that Muslim Filipinos have helped in its modernization.

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But in a sense, Ambassador Al-Ghamdi’s initiative towards better relations between the two countries are not new. Close relations between the two countries have been there for ages. They just needed to be revived and returned to the mainstream of influence from ancient to contemporary times. Through his work, Ambassador Al-Ghamdi brings the relations between our countries into a full circle. Many years back before the Spaniards came to the Philippines, Mindanao was already a flourishing region under the influence of Islamic culture and government.

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Datu Norodin Alonto Lucman narrates in his recently published book Moro Archives that "prior to the discovery of the Philippines by the Spaniards in 1521, Mindanao Sultanates from Sulu to Luzon had already attained an advanced level of civilization, patterned after the Islamic caliphate model." Although time and again, commentators, including our national hero, Jose Rizal, have said that political organization was far advanced in Mindanao than the village community (baranggay Malay: Balanghay) system found in Luzon and the Visayas, this is a historical truism that cannot be overstressed. We must keep repeating it and telling the world how life was in Mindanao before the arrival of the Spaniards. Only then can we begin to understand why our kababayan Muslims should wish to preserve their culture. Arabic script was used for the local languages and literacy in the Arabic language to learning the Koran was taught in the madrasas (Arabic schools) to generations of native Mindanaoans. Although the aim of education was primarily for religious studies, the natives were exposed to other fields of knowledge and literature from the Middle East.

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By the way Datu Lucman, is running for vice governor in Lanao. Mindanao watchers see his candidacy as a good sign that the quality of politics in the south has a sound future. He follows a worthy line of other native Muslims who have rendered exemplary public service to the country. Al-Ghamdi cited Senator Ahmed Domocao Alonto who received the most coveted award in the Islamic world, the King Faisal Prize for Service to Islam in 1985. Alonto was a founding father both of the Rabitatul Alam Al Islam (World Muslim League) and the Mindanao State University.

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All this is to say that there is much to be done in relations between the two countries. As Ambassador Al-Ghamdi is fond of saying, "considering how much more work there is to be done, we must be patient." "It will come. It will come," he replies when we tell him what a pity that both countries could gain more if it had better relations. It is his aim to put relations between the two countries where it should be – relations between peoples with historical links. He promises that we will see more of Arab officials and visitors coming here and vice versa. We tend to forget that there are already hundreds of thousands of Filipinos living and working in Saudi Arabia, not to count those who are in the rest of the Middle East. Saudi Arabia is now second home to some 800,000 OFWs and it is increasing by 250 more each day. That makes Saudi Arabia the second biggest employer of Filipinos, second only to the national government. Together they remit millions of dollars to their families in the Philippines. Surely that fact alone should make relations with Saudi Arabia a priority and deserving better attention in official circles than we have hitherto given it.

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Documentary on Imelda. This project is definitely on. I just received a phone call from their representatives in Manila who announced that interviews would be scheduled for early May. I am told that other people who may have something to contribute to the documentary have been contacted. One such person who was contacted was Arnold Zeitlin, the former AP bureau chief. He now lives in Hong Kong. Zeitlin got his information on the Imelda documentary from a friend in New York, who quoted my column, "Abiding curiosity on Imelda" and conveyed it to Veronica. And all this was done through e-mail. Isn’t technology wonderful, especially because I have never met Arnold Zeitlin. Remember Zeitlin? He was the controversial AP bureau manager who covered the Marcos regime. At the time he was in Manila, I was in London. If Zeitlin will consent to be interviewed for the documentary, then we can expect that the project will be an independent undertaking, that is, independent of the Marcoses. In his e-mail to Veronica he included a hilarious account of his "relations" with Imelda, which I regret I am not free to publish without his permission.

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My e-mail address is [email protected]