Next round

We were told that communication starts with the basic skills in listening, reading, writing and speaking.  We listen to learn from others, we read to know things, we write to express ourselves, and we speak to present our ideas.

But there are other forms of communication, one of which is persuasion.  It usually comes with a purpose of influencing and shaping public opinion. Next is negotiation which is a give and take process. Lastly, we have conflict management which tries to diffuse tensions or precarious situations.

Communication skills and persuasion, negotiation, and conflict resolution play an important role to the current state of the peace talks between the government and the MILF-MNLF.

There has been delay in the peace process because of the still unresolved issue of facilitation in the peace process between the two panels. Facilitation is used in business and organizational settings to ensure the designing and running of successful meetings.

This process is also used in a variety of group settings, including business and other organizations to describe someone whose role it is to work with group processes to ensure meetings run well and achieve a high degree of consensus.

A facilitator, on the other hand, is someone who assists people with communication disorders to use communication aids with their hands.

In the GRP-MILF/MNLF talks, both sides agree that there is no orderly process of facilitation, the pending status of which has not enabled the immediate commencement of talks.

As there are two sides to the negotiations, should one side have concerns with respect to how the facilitation is set up, that side is entitled to raise concerns on the facilitation through proper channels.

Malaysia, which has been facilitating the talks since 2001, remains as the facilitator but the Aquino administration has expressed some concerns on the facilitation.

In any negotiation, there should be a level of comfort with regard the infrastructure for the talks that will carry both sides through for the long haul.

According to the MILF, the resumption of talks should begin at the point where negotiations ended last June 3, 2010, adding any attempt to disregard the gains of the negotiation will derail the peace process.

President Aquino’s statement that talks would resume after Ramadan is an open-ended statement since it did not mention a specific date. MILF believes that the delay in the resumption of talks was caused by the President’s alleged insincerity as the government was just concerned with the process.

To resolve the facilitation issue immediately, the government and the MILF/MNLF need to come up with much better proposals.

Before facing each other at the negotiating table again, the panels should communicate with each other through the facilitator.

If there are issues raised (on the facilitation process), these should be discussed in the formal negotiations.

In addition, the government has to reach out to the grassroots and influential sectors in and out of government. It is imperative for the government peace panel to convince the people in the area as well as those credible and honorable members of the community to believe in the process.

The government has to get lawmakers on board the peace process. The House of Representatives and the Senate should be one with the government in the process since all the branches of government have a stake in the results of the effort poured into the peace negotiation in Mindanao. I believe it’s about time to craft a national peace policy to solidify the past and present outcomes of the peace talks.

The bigger public including the media should be also reached out for them to understand the issue.

We need to undertake an advocacy to educate the Filipino people on the GRP-MILF/MNLF negotiation, the importance of its success, and the costs of the conflict if it will continue.

The recurring issue on the peace process boils down to the effective use of communication skills, from the simple to the more complex, to put an end to the decade-long negotiations.

Thus, communication professionals, armed with the proper negotiation abilities, are called to help and make the next round of peace process a success.