More information and education campaign are needed before Cordillerans can appreciate the path of self-rule for the upland region.

OVER a recent local radio program on indigenous peoples? concerns, Erlinda Tindo of the Baguio Diocese?s Social Action Center asked other Igorot people to help pray for the recovery of former President Corazon Aquino.

Aquino, 77, who has been battling colon cancer since 2008, should be credited for having helped mainstream the cause of autonomy for the Cordillera, says Tindo, an Ibaloi from Tublay, Benguet.

Tindo was right. Before Aquino was swept to the presidency by a civilian-backed military revolt in February 1986, the concern and debate over autonomy for the Cordillera and for Muslim Mindanao were confined among activists, who helped battle the martial rule imposed by strongman Ferdinand Marcos.

Under Marcos, people who advocated autonomy or self-rule were among those considered threats to national security. Many sons and daughters of the Cordillera, for example, were forced to go underground as they were treated by soldiers as antigovernment for espousing self-rule for the upland region.

Democratic space

One of the more prominent Cordillerans was the late Tinggian priest Conrado Balweg, who, after exhausting all legal means but failing to help stop the operations of a Marcos crony-owned paper mill, was forced to join the New People?s Army.

But Balweg, a Cordillera autonomy advocate, broke away from his comrades, formed his own liberation army, and made peace with the Aquino administration, which provided a ?democratic space? that paved the way for the free discussion of autonomy.

After Balweg and Aquino forged a peace pact in September, 1986, at Mount Data in Mt. Province, Aquino issued Executive Order 220, which created the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR).

Through EO 220, the Cordillera provinces were grouped into an administrative region. Under Marcos, Benguet, Mt. Province and Abra became part of Region 1 (Ilocos), while Ifugao, Kalinga and Apayao belonged to Region 2 (Cagayan Valley).

To autonomy activists, the division of the Cordillera was Marcos? ?divide-and-rule? tactic over the upland region, which was rich in timber, minerals and energy resources.

EO 220 also created other interim bodies, such as the Cordillera Regional Assembly (CRA) and the Cordillera Executive Board (CEB), which were mandated to help prepare the grounds for an autonomous region.

Through EO 220, many Cordillera government personnel and professionals, including those who never raised a voice on autonomy under the Marcos dictatorship, found themselves in juicy positions in line agencies created under the CAR setup. Some traditional politicians also found their way in these interim agencies.

Organic act

Meantime, peoples? organizations from the Cordillera and Mindanao lobbied for the cause of autonomy to be integrated in the 1987 Constitution.

They succeeded in convincing the drafters to incorporate in the Charter the right of indigenous peoples to govern their region and use their resources for their own development based on customary laws and traditions.

But the constitutional provision needed an enabling law, which would detail the mechanisms for self-rule. Under Aquino, the Cordillera Regional Consultative Commission was formed to draft an organic act or a proposed law for self-rule.

The region selected its best and brightest experts, backed by autonomy activists, to draft the proposed law. Through their community-based peoples? organization networks, the drafters consulted communities and produced an organic act, which many hailed as an ideal draft as it could pave the way to reverse a long history of state neglect and underdevelopment.

But the drafters complained that Congress mangled the organic act, subjecting everything -- including the right of the Cordillera people to use their resources according to their customary laws?to national laws and ?national interest.?

The late human rights lawyer Arthur Galace, who helped draft the organic act, said the document was ?so mangled beyond recognition? that he campaigned for its rejection when it was subjected to a plebiscite in 1990.

Autonomy advocates from different spectrums, including Balweg and other peoples? organizations, which helped support the organic act drafting, also campaigned for its rejection. As a result, only Ifugao voted for the proposed law.

The autonomy cause was revived under President Fidel Ramos and another law was drafted and presented in a plebiscite in 1998. This time, only Apayao voted for it.

With the experience from the two plebiscites, officials now led by National Economic and Development Authority Cordillera Director Juan Ngalob are saying that more information and education campaign are needed before Cordillerans can appreciate the path of self-rule.

For Ngalob, self-rule has no timetable because it may not be achieved even under his lifetime. What is important, he says, is that the concern for autonomy is being debated and is being discussed even in classrooms.