Monday, July 18, 2016

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

For The Bohol Tribune
In This Our Journey
NESTOR MANIEBO PESTELOS

As everyone knows, the number of so-called surrenderees, a term adapted widely by the media to refer to drug users who signed with government and police authorities not to use illegal chemical substances again, soared to staggering proportion early in the week all over the country. In Bohol alone, the number reported increased from something around 3,000 to 4,600 during the weekend and then to 6,000 climbing to 9,000 at the start of this week. (Note: it's now 18,000 based on latest compilation!)

My initial response was to go find a cave elsewhere and bring my family to hole in there until the imagined holocaust trips over. When I look around, however, in-between reading Facebook posts, I realized there was no panic at all about the situation.

Everything appears normal. Facebook reflects, at least as far our network is concerned, shown on public mode, that people are mostly having fun, celebrating birthdays and anniversaries, feasting and cavorting on the white-sand beach, admiring sunsets and the vast expanse of the sea around us as though seeing these natural wonders for the first time, enjoying life to the hilt despite the grim possibility of a crime rise in our midst as a result of untreated mental condition arising from repeated drug use.

My two sons, Gabe and Odoni, both in their twenties, would come home past midnight as usual and I suppose, despite all these drug buy-bust operations ending up in quite gory bloody scenes in the bush, crowded bus, busy street and all, everything is as normal as can be in our beloved Bohol. Hence, more blessings, oh Lord. Everything is A-OK, bless our leaders in all sectors, government and non-government that because of their deafening silence about it all, everything must be alright under the new regime.

In the popular imagination, at least, everything is just OK and so why bother. Enjoy your beer and make San Miguel richer and happier! I must be in the wrong planet, worrying about it all. Anyway, for whatever it is worth, I am sharing some advice from friends, old and newly-found ones, on what could be a good strategy to cope with a situation that we have 9,000 drug users outside some form of a rehabilitation or counselling process.

And so here it is, how a personal quest unfolded during the week which I am sharing not for any dramatic value (read: gossip!) but to raise key issues that could somehow result in a response to a potentially risky situation which can scar us for life emotionally and otherwise.

13 July, Sunday. We had our Action Group Meeting (AGM) with our cluster of brods and sis from the organization I joined in 2015, the Brotherhood of Christian Businessmen and Professionals (BCBP) held at Crescencia CafĂ© at my in-laws’ place in Baclayon. As is the practice during such small-group meetings, we chose a passage from the Bible, pick up a phase and then individually share our thoughts with the other group members.

The assigned passage for this AGM was Luke 10:25-37, a popular one, known by many cathechists and Bible Study Groups the world over as “The Parable of the Good Samaritan.”
5.05 a.m. There was a loud bang followed by total darkness. Now I have a flashlight and lighted candle-in-a-glass jar near this laptop. I am thinking there must be a message there, the brown out happening as I review the passage from the Bible by my side.

But I refuse to be distracted by any further thought. To continue: I chose this sentence from the assigned text: “Love your neighbor as you love yourself,” and used it as the basis for my sharing.

After the meeting, during dinner, the conversation turned to this matter about the surrenderees. All of a sudden, the whole room was overwhelmed with excited voices from the dozen or so members indicating keen interest on the subject by our Action Group which I took it to mean this must be a popular sentiment, that many people would like to share their bit to do something about the situation.

Our couple leaders, Irwyn and Joy Lumuthang, stayed behind to discuss the issue some more and before they left, they said they would bring the matter to the attention of the Chapter President, Jun Navarro. I immediately set to work putting flesh to the ideas which had been thrown around before, drafted a concept and named it the Good Samaritan Project, no doubt inspired by the Biblical selection for the day.

Let me directly quote pertinent portions of the draft concept so that readers may also share their thoughts with us or their neighbors, whoever they conceive them to be.

Overall Goal

To ensure that each surrenderee is provided a comprehensive package of services from pre-treatment to full recovery.

Specific Objectives

a.       To establish a baseline data on the condition of each surrenderee which will serve as basis for treatment and post-treatment interventions;
b.      To ensure systematic provision of counselling and other services with the full cooperation and assistance of the family and the local community;
c.       To monitor regularly the progress of each client and adjust inputs accordingly;
d.      To document outstanding cases of full recovery and successful integration with both the family and the community.
Strategy
To achieve its objectives, the project will adopt an implementation strategy with the following features:

a)      Partnership with all key sectors with specific inputs to deliver;
b)      Mobilization of volunteers who will be organized into teams assigned to specific cluster of target clients in specific location and linked to specific focal person in the project management committee;
c)      Organization of families of clients to ensure spiritual and other support to target clients.
d)      Designation of a pilot area where implementation approaches can be tested based on current organizational capability, existence of willing partners, and affordability.

Key Activities

-Link up with drug rehab centers in nearby regions and consult them if they can help conduct a systematic diagnosis of those arrested and those who surrendered to determine a) who can be treated at home; b) those who must be treated in a drug rehab facility; and (c) those whose mental conditions has worsened due to long period of drug use and must be committed to a mental hospital instead.

-Recruit and train volunteers who can serve as counsellors for both drug abuse victims and their respective families;

-Train nursing, psychology and/or social work or social science students and their teachers on the use of diagnostic tools so that the diagnosis could be done on a massive scale simultaneously to cover more than 4,600 surrenderees;

-Formulate and implement a short-term orientation or basic skills training course for all the volunteers who are willing to do this work;

-Liaise with partner drug rehab centers and institutions and seek their advice on how to fast-tract treatment at substantially lower costs;

-Organize an interim core team who will assist in mobilizing support from all sectors (Government, Church and faith-based organizations; private sector; civil society organizations, academic institutions, etc.

-Get an updated list of surrenderees and all relevant data about them for planning purposes.

Note: This is a tentative list. More can be added.

Organization and Management

Details will be provided in accordance with the role to be undertaken by the organization, whether as proponent/implementation agency or one of the partner agencies.

I used this project concept as basic document to discuss with others from various organizations who shared the same concern with us.

Due to limited space, I will just summarize here what have been given to us during the discussion or through the internet:

From Rene Francisco, CEO of FARM It Chemical Dependency Center in Bohol who has had eighteen years’ experience in rehabilitation work.  He suggested a 45-day program for those who need rehabilitation. In coordination with LGUs and other institutions, old unutilized buildings can be used to serve as rehab centers. In the absence of these old structures in the municipality, having the surrenderers in tent cities could be an alternative structure. He is ready to work with a network of drug rehab centers in Cebu and Mindanao who can provide
training to rehab workers and volunteers in Bohol.

Alain Alinio who is from the FARM Drug Rehab Center in Cebu and also a network of such facilities in Visayas and Mindanao has discussed their proposal with representatives of the Provincial Government and will be willing to offer terms, too, for doing rehabilitation work with the surrenderees.

Fr. Clarito Rara also attended the meeting last 15 July in Baclayon. He has had 17 years of experience in counselling drug abuse victims in a military camp at the Veterans Hospital in Houston, Texas. He has since returned to Bohol and runs a counselling clinics in one of the parishes. He is willing to be part of the planning and implementation team to address the critical problem regarding the surrenderees.

Bel Jayco of the International Learning Center in Cortez says she can mobilize social workers who can help in documenting cases and provide auxiliary work in the various centers. She also says she can liaise with the government to be partner in this venture.

Today, Saturday, I will go around with Rene Francisco to visit some structures in the municipalities that can serve as rehab centers for this growing number of drug users being identified each day.

We will come up with a detailed project design next week for presentation with the Government, the Church and other key sectors wanting to do something about the need to extent rehabilitation services to the drug users who have surrendered these past few weeks. For comments: Email: npestelos@gmail.com

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