Mr. Walter I. Balane is a journalist from Mindanao. He is one of the invited resource speaker of the 2nd Mindanao Bloggers Summit held recently in October 25, 2008 at General Santos City. Here below is the contents of Mr. Balane privilege discourse presented during the summit. 



Good morning!

I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to speak today on the topic: Voices from the Heartroots: Notes on Life and Living in communities.

My sharing is largely about my personal experience and reflections as a “journalist who blogs”.

Yes, a journalist who blogs, that’s how I call my self now. It sounds remarkable. But there’s an anomaly in the phrase because journalists are supposed to be busy with reportage. How come they have time to blog?

Actually, when I opened an account with blogspot in mid-2004, I only meant to “go with the uso”.

Parang hi-tech kasi pakinggan. May blog ako! (kahit hindi naman alam ng mga kaibigan ko dati ano yang blog.) I bragged about it!

Sa tingin ko since my email address naman ako at natuto ng magchat, mag google, baka its time to go “next level”.

So the blogger in me was born.

This was also the time when I was already serious about crossing over from print to online media. I joined MindaNews in 2002 and moved to its Davao office in 2004.

Then, the reason why I blogged was because I wanted to see my articles online.

I thought of putting up an archive of my stories from MindaNews.com and from the local newspaper in Bukidnon that I was editing.

Since most of my stories were about my coverage of Bukidnon and Mindanao as a whole, I thought of calling it ISTAMBAY SA MINDANAO (Standing by in Mindanao).

Like any beginner, my early experience in blogging was about experimentation and adventurism. Sa time na yon, hindi ko pa kilala sina Blogie Robillo, Avel, at iba pang bloggers.

Ang alam ko blogger ako at reporter ako. Ako si Istambay sa Mindanao. Nasisiyahan akong mabasa ang mga naisulat ko. Feeling ko meron ding mga tao na nagbabasa ng mga post ko. Feeling lang.

Kasama sa naging experiment ko ang pagmigrate galing blogspot papuntang wordpress noong 2006.

Slowly, I got hits and there were those who were kind enough to post comments.

Mukhang masaya.

Ngunit magulo din.

Ilang beses din akong na reprimand ng editor ko dahil na nauna kong napost sa blog ko and isang istorya bago ko na ifile sa desk.

At sa isa pang araw, merong nag post ng comment na violent reaction doon sa sinulat ko sa blog.

At sumunod pa ang isang comment na “paki ko sa opinion mo” “ano ba ang alam mo sa sitwasyon” .

Hindi ko rin pweding kalimutan ang mga spam message na kong pumasok akalo mo na marami nang nagreact sa post mo.

Napag-isipan ko na parang hindi ko pa na harmonize ang pagiging blogger at reporter ko at saka naging self-publisher na ako na parang “the world revolves around me” as if the world cares about my news, my aspirations, dreams, reactions, pains, and victories.

These and other factors made me reflect on why I blog and why I should continue blogging.

The responsibility is doubled with me as a journalist who should keep his credibility, focus, and relevance intact.

It is trippled with the fact that my setting is Mindanao where there are a lot of stories, good or bad, which are left untold.

I decided to be a journalist first as it should be.

But I also decided to continue blogging. I can’t imagine myself “not blogging”. In fact I learned to tweak on my header, sidebar and other stuff on my dashboard.

With the focus on my job as a journalist, I became more conscious about reporting (and blogging) accurately, about using more point of views, about ground-truthing, and about fairness, balance, and timeliness.

I learned that if my voice should count it will only count so much.

I have to use my platform as a journalist to cover the different and diverse voices around me.

I cannot just rely on the opinion or statements of the usual and official sources.

I have to be on the ground to get the facts right and fast.

I learned most of these things when I joined a team formed by MindaNews to do grassroots reporting and documentation training engagements in communities around Mindanao.

In Caraga, Davao Oriental; Tandag, Surigao del Sur; in Upi, Maguindanao; in Bagra, Cotabato City; In Midsayap, North Cotabato; In Iligan City, In Kumalarang, Zamboanga del Sur and in other commuities I learned that the people there have stories to tell and yet we don’t hear them at all.

Most of these peoples and communities battle hunger, fear, ignorance, and isolation everyday.

They seek peace, justice, hope, life, victories,even the most basic --- food.

The mainstream media cannot cover everything. Sometimes they choose not to cover it at all or cover it smacked with generalizations, misrepresentations, and angles taken out of context, among other concerns.

This is a challenge for journalists and an opportunity for bloggers.

Already, Mindanao bloggers are known as organized and ahead of other blogging communities in the country.

Blogging has already occupied a level of command in the information highway.

That is why I believe this could be handy.

Blogging the Mindanawon consciousness could be blogging more about these peoples, issues, events, concerns, dreams.

We are ought to give them the chance because opportunities for them to express themselves and be heard are scarce.

This is especially true in a time when Mindanao continues to experience unpeace and is misunderstood in many ways.

Mindanawons blogging about Mindanao is a natural course and is the perfect energy needed.

It might not be enough, however, that there are Mindanao bloggers who discuss on Mindanao from their online platforms.

We, Mindanawon bloggers can only do so much. We can speak only for ourselves, our work, our views on Mindanao, our feelings, reactions, victories, pains, excitements, plans, dreams, and aspirations.


We have to gather more voices and flood the information superhighway with solutions, too, not just problems.

But a bigger part of Mindanao’s people is still “offline”. They are not yet connected to many things linked in Mindanao, enjoyed in Mindanao.

Ang kadaghanan wala pa makasakay sa sakyanan nga gigamit sa uban.

Apparently, there is a big gap between the volume of the voices of Mindanao’s bloggers and those of the “offline Mindanawons” in expressing their humanity.

“Blogging the Mindanawon Consciousness” might mean bridging this gap.

Mindanao bloggers might consider helping enable other key sectors and peoples in their communities to blog about themselves.

Blogging might not only be limited to blogging about Mindanao and its peoples but also helping the “voiceless” learn to blog so they, too, can blog about themselves.

Of course it would be extremely difficult for existing Mindanao bloggers to acess many of the areas safely and for the people in communities to appraoch which local bloggers can help them.

But bloggers must continue to try linking them and engaging them for mutual respect and understanding in an effort to connect more and more people.

Many of us who are already blogging about the voiceless must continue doing it and infect others to do the same.

We can focus on a Mindanao consciousness that is more inclusive, not exclusive.

Let us blog about how we can build the “we” among Mindanawons and not on “us” and “them”.

On the other hand, many of us might be turned-off by this kind of appeal.

Sometimes we have the impression that blogging about the conflict is flooding the information highway with bad news about Mindanao, when bloggers wanted to change the image to “good”.

But how can we have good news if we continue to blur and ignore the not-good news.

Mind you, there are also good stories that come out from the evacuation sites: there are stories of resilience, stories of hope, stories of dreams, stories of humanity.

There are many opportunities to give voice and attention to people in the communities, like helping explain (of course to understand it first) the peace process in general and the MOA-AD in particular.

My editor Carol Arguillas told me earlier that she commends our fellow blogger Sarah Matalam for what she is doing and blogging about: connecting people who have something to share to the bakwits in Pikit and neighboring areas.

It is not as easy as I say it here.

But we are not only bloggers. We are Mindanawon bloggers.

Altogether in our own communities cities and circles of influence we can collectively promote the Mindanawon consciousness.

Indeed it will not be easy.

I liken it to our trip yesterday from Iligan-CDO-Bukidnon in Bobby Timonera’s Mitsubishi Adventure.

Along the way, there were good and picture perfect sights, an early lunch, fresh air and fruits, lively chats, and good music.

But there were also spoilers like a heavy rain in Malaybalay, more expensive unleaded gas in Maramag, a busted tire in Damulog, Bukidnon, chargers left at home, and endless detours over long and winding routes.

But we made it here. We all made it here.

Yes, Mindanao bloggers can make it.

Thank you and once again good morning!