Pope Francis’ announcement to appoint Archbishop Orlando Beltran Quevedo of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate as cardinal, the first ever from Mindanao, speaks well of his seriousness in addressing the issue of poverty. Archbishop Quevedo like Pope Francis has linked the problem of poverty to structural roots. Quevedo believes that the problem of peace in Mindanao is a problem of injustice. This is a hopeful attitude that bodes well not just for Mindanao but for the whole country. The great hope is that Catholicism might find here a renewed relevance for our people.
Born 11th of March 1939 in Laoag, Ilocos Norte, Quevedo has been a priest for 62 years. He shares something with the new Pope. They were both priests who came to their mid-careers in a time of great conflict highlighted by a rising communist movement set against murderous state repression and mass poverty. The communist movements have waned somewhat over the years and yet mass poverty is still very much there.
In the 1980s, the Church had been engaged in social work backgrounded by what was called by its adherents “a theology of liberation.” Part of this engagement involved the organizing of grassroots communities among the poor so that they might work to defend themselves from oppression and in due course liberate themselves from poverty.
This movement was controversial and divisive from the very beginning. In due time, it became less popular but so also weakened the Church’s active involvement in social work and grassroots organizing. Yet, recent statements from Pope Francis sound almost like a call for his priests to once again as if never before begin confronting the structural causes of poverty all over the world.
Orlando Quevedo is Archishop of Cotabato.
His appointment as cardinal has been hailed by both Christians and Muslims alike. More than any other bishop he has the wealth of experience working among the poor in Mindanao whatever their religion. His appointment will have positive impact on the peace process currently being negotiated between Muslims and the government. But more than this, new political developments especially related to the termination of the pork barrel system call for greater involvement by the Church in countryside development.
The end of the pork barrel system has generally been welcomed as a positive step in ending corruption. And yet, this development could also mean a return to an over-centralized political mechanism for funding development projects nationwide. To counteract this, the system of “bottom-up financing” has been established for countryside development.
Francisco “Bimbo” Fernandez, Under Secretary of the Department of Interior and Local Government (and brother of this writer), is managing this system nationwide. According to Fernandez, this system makes available from between P15 million to P50 million to each municipality and city nationwide to fund poverty-alleviation projects. But to avail of this, local governments units must work with civil society organizations as equal partners. This system works to replace the old, corrupt pork barrel system.
It is not a theoretically perfect corruption-proof system. But it will be a system where both local government units and civil society organizations are at least accountable to each other. And if only for just the fact more people are involved, it will be a harder system to corrupt. It has the greater chance of addressing much more effectively the problem of poverty especially in the rural countryside. However, there must be sufficient number of empowered rural grassroots organizations working. Which returns us to the issue of the Church and its once active social action network.
The availability of these funds should provide the impetus for greater organizing work in the rural grassroots. The Church is in the best position to lead the way in this enterprise. It certainly has sufficient experience in the person of Archbishop Orlando Quevedo judging by his background of involvement in the Justice and Peace movement and people empowerment.
Pope Francis has asked the faithful to pray for his new appointees. Fortunately for us, the prayer is for the soon-to-be Orlando Cardinal Quevedo simply to be true to what he has been doing all these years.