PHILIPPINES: Aquino Urged to Tap More Women on Peace Panel

Women have been proven to be better equipped than men in handling the more emotional aspects of peace negotiations, said the outgoing head of Malacañang's peace office.

Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Annabelle Abaya urged the incoming Aquino administration to place more women on the government panel with the secessionist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) as she noted their critical role in balancing or cooling the usually tense atmosphere in talks.

Abaya said government negotiating panels should include at least two women.

“I hope that all panels -- the MILF or the CPP-NPA (New People's Army) -- at least have two women- not one but two women, because women change the dynamics of negotiation,” Abaya said.

She said women had a better grasp of emotions, always a factor in settling contentious matters.

“When people are talking about rationale, you cannot forget the emotional aspect. Although people will do not want to put that on the table, the reality is people think because of what they feel. So it is the women who are more comfortable with this aspect of negotiation,” Abaya said.

She noted that talks would at times break down because parties disagree on the use of a single word. Separate government panels are holding a dialog with the CPP-NPA and the MILF while sporadic violence would erupt between the government and the armed groups.

The current government panel for talks with the MILF only has one woman while the panel dealing with the CPP has three, according to Abaya.

The incoming administration will likely reconstitute the negotiating panels but Abaya said the new leadership must ensure “institutional memory” in the talks and build on the gains of the Arroyo administration.

“I'd be very careful about preserving institutional memory so that they don't frustrate the other side. This has been the complaint of the panel on the other side that members of the panel keep changing, and they have to be oriented again,” Abaya said.

Incoming President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III is expected to install former executive official Teresita “Ging” Deles as his peace adviser. Deles will be returning to her position in Malacañang before she resigned from the Arroyo Cabinet in 2005 amid election cheating charges against the administration.

Abaya is set to hand over to Deles a “closure document” that traces back gains in negotiations under the outgoing administration to “pave the way for a seamless turnover of peace negotiations in next administration.”