PHILIPPINE MUSLIMS TACKLE TALIBAN?

Today, I read about a couple who were stoned to death in Kabul, Afghanistan. "The Taliban on Sunday ordered their first public executions by stoning since their fall from power nine years ago, killing a young couple who had eloped, according to Afghan officials and a witness." (NYT,Aug. 15

I squirmed in my seat while reading it. I could not imagine how the Taliban leaders, knowing they have the power in their hands to allow anyone to live and breathe could use it to extinguish life as well. Under what authority do they get this power to kill? Who tells them it is all right to kill? If this is from the Koran, I think they are misreading the passages in that book.

Anyway, this incident has made me resolve to read the Koran and truly study its contents. Many people are using the Koran to do their kind of justice in this world and most of the time it is rather disconcerting -- many people are getting killed not out of choice which I think is the only reason for dying.

I was just talking to a Muslim datu at a restaurant and he was smiling all the time, talking about his buy and sell business. I wanted him to sell my painting also but unfortunately,I could not leave it with him for personal reasons. But when I mentioned to him that I would give him copies of my book, he asked me if I had read "Mayor," and another title which is about the history of the Philippines.

Then I deduced that he is nationalistic after all. I had thought they, the Muslims want to separate from our country but then he gave me a different impression which means there is a brighter side to all the peacetalks that would be forthcoming.

I really think the peacetalks should happen but this should be conducted by people not identified with any other religion. I think that this is where the trouble comes in when, say a Catholic official would talk with a Muslim and then begin from an authoritative and messiahnic viewpoint which truly turns off our Muslim brothers and sisters. Or the official would talk in a bureaucratic manner, citing technical matters instead of getting involved in building solidarity, brotherhood and sisterhood with them. A feeling of solidarity should permeate every moment of the peacetalks -- making our Muslim brothers and sisters feel that they are not different from us.

In fact, when I talk to the Muslim vendors, I find they full of humour and humble. They do not exhibit the braggadocio of the Luzonian peoples. They would also allow you to haggle well without feeling angry, unlike those in Batangas and other parts of Luzon. I don't know but really some of the Luzonian vendors I have met have this tendency to identify with their products and so feel too sensitive when the consumers haggle for a lower price. But to the Muslims? You can haggle for hours and hours and they would not lose their patience at all. They see that as part of being in business, and they must think that their products are there to be sold off, and not to be kept as a medal to dignify them.

Hence, once we get our peacetalks going and the Muslims open up, I am sure we would be a leading force in maintaining peace in the world. Our brothers and sisters in the south are not that truly alienated from international politics but they would not embrace the extreme Taliban culture. In fact, we know that they would not even enter into those suicide bombing missions for fear of dying prematurely, as many sectors say also.

Also the men have an egalitarian view of women. How many Muslim women I see in Greenhills shopping malls but more or less than a hundred. They carry their family business with great aplomb, as if it were second nature to them. And this is the kind of image of women that I would like to see in the world -- women respected by their immediate relatives to lead them economically. No Taliban would dare overturn such an image.

Hence, I think that our Muslim leaders have a larger role to play in world not only local politics. We must egg them to extend the peace methods beyond our shores and truly help in attaining a peaceful and equal world. Our Muslim sisters could also help greatly as they have imbibed or they have been influenced by the liberal culture that the American colonizers have instilled in us through education and through interaction in media.
I am sure they could be world leaders in the Muslim world given that chance to serve in the highest echelons of decision-making in the United Nations and all other Islamic gatherings.

Isn't it high time that the leaders of the Muslim world start shedding off their patriarchal stance and look at women as equals. I am sure this would save a lot of lives wasted in wars that seem to have no end.