By Kathleen Zambas
Young members of the Mamanwa-Manobo indigenous peoples group in Lanuza, Surigao Del Sur joined a youth program we facilitated. The program aims to train youth leaders in developing and implementing plans and projects that will support the conservation efforts of the volunteer Bantay Banwa (forest guard) group.
“Ang kaugmaon sa tribu atua sa mga kamot sa kabataan” (the future of the tribe is in the hands of the youth) said Datu Pedang, echoing the famous words of Jose Rizal. The volunteer Bantay Banwa group aspires to engage the next generation in protecting the ancestral domain through education and empowerment.
Twenty Mamanwa-Manobo youth came together for the Lanuza Youth Program Orientation and Workshop to join trainings on environmental topics and even to create action plans. The two-day activity was the first where youth from different sub-communities of the same tribe came together.
Thirteen-year-old Eric Bastro, said that the event was an opportunity to help the tribe with a safe community water source through the riverbank clean-up initiative. Nineteen-year-old Honey Jane Callote, an aspiring teacher, hoped that the storytelling project would help bring awareness about different environmental issues and its impact on their culture. After the activity, she said she felt a sense of achievement that she was able to create a proposal together with other youth.
The community-based projects developed were scheduled for implementation in the tribe’s sub-communities within the year.
The Bantay Banwas and elders also committed to help monitor the progress of the projects and expressed their support to the group. “Kini ang among pagpaapil kaninyo mao isa ka pagpaningkamot alang kamo magpadayon sa pag protektar ug pagpangga sa yutang kabilin sa atoa” (This effort of involving you is our way to encourage you to continue to protect and love our ancestral domain that was left by our ancestors), added Datu Jessie, a Bantay Banwa and tribe leader for the youth during the workshop.
The Mamanwa-Manobo tribe resides within Mt. Hilong-Hilong in their ancestral domain which is over 11,000 hectares. The domain covers the Municipality of Lanuza, Cortes and Tandag City of Surigao Del Sur province. Historically, the tribe has struggled with various forms of discrimination. It is their elders’ hope that their children and youth no longer have to go through mistreatment and displacement.
Kahugpungan Tribung Mamanwa-Manobo or KATRIMMA is an organized community based organization and a partner of Haribon Foundation with the support of European Union and Birdlife International for the Forest Governance Project or FoGoP in Surigao Del Sur, Mindanao.
