The business sector should continue to invest in peacebuilding by using their influence to help the poor and the marginalized, Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) Secretary Martin Andanar said.
Andanar made this remark during a forum on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in Cagayan de Oro City (CDO), where he discussed Executive Order 70 – which underscores a whole-of-nation approach to attaining peace in conflict-affected areas.
Speaking before stakeholders of the Regional Task Force to End Local Communist and Armed Conflict (RTF-ELCAC), Andanar explained the essence of the order which meant that it is every Filipino’s responsibility to realize and sustain peace.
“All of us, everyone, the whole of nation is dutifully responsible for [peace]. We produce peace from our homes, we pursue it outside our homes, and we preserve it in the whole of nation for all time and for all,” Andanar said in his speech.
Andanar, who is also the designated Cabinet Officer for Regional Development and Security for Northern Mindanao (CORDS-10), stressed how it is the responsibility of the private sector to share their resources.
The PCOO chief said the private sector could do their part by providing relief packages for calamity-hit victims, creating homes for Filipino families, and building classrooms.
“This is the task where all of you, are, in truth and in reality, the active participants. Essentially, this involves the responsibility of those who have more in wealth, to share substantially, in whatever manner and form, to those who have no opportunity at all, nor even the wherewithal, to reach some measure of obtaining a comfortable enough life,” Andanar said.
Lamenting how many poor Filipinos were forced to rebel, the PCOO chief said the private sector could also provide a “platform” to enlighten those misguided and misinformed about the root cause of their defiance.
Meanwhile, Andanar said President Rodrigo Duterte remained confident that private sector investment in tutoring and sustaining a livelihood for rebellious sectors would be “successful models for other disenfranchised communities.”
On December 2018, Duterte signed Executive Order 70 which created a National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict and adopt a national peace framework in the country as part of the government’s continued efforts to achieve peace.
EO 70 institutionalizes the whole-of-nation approach in addressing the root causes of insurgencies, internal disturbances, and other threats by prioritizing and harmonizing the delivery of basic services and the government’s social development packages, facilitating societal inclusivity, and ensuring active participation of all sectors of the society in the pursuit of the country’s peace agenda. (PNA)
