As men, women, and young people lingered in Davao City’s night market on Friday, the 2nd of September, a bomb exploded killing at least 15 people and injuring some 71. The Abu Sayyaf Group immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing. Days before the attack, President Rodrigo Duterte deployed 8,000 armed troopers to fight the Abu Sayyaf in their lair, making it easy to surmise that the attack was meant to embarrass the President and divide the focus of the armed troops.
Since Sept. 11, 2001 when Al Qaida terrorists brought down the World Trade Twin Towers in New York City and attacked the Pentagon, killing 3,000 people, terrorist attacks have been happening all over the globe on a monthly basis (Wikipedia). This year, the highest number of fatalities from terrorist atrocities happened in July where more than 2,269 died in 190 incidents in several countries. France has been at the receiving end of some of the deadliest attacks in recent history where 130 perished and 200 injured in the shooting in Paris in November 2015 while 86 were killed and 300 injured in July this year when a truck plowed into a crowd of spectators watching the Bastille Day fireworks display in Nice.
One cannot help but wonder, what kind of persons are capable of carrying out such ruthless atrocities on helpless, innocent people? Do they not have parents, spouses or children? For sure, each one of them were born to families that nurtured them until they became adults or were able to fend for themselves. So, what motivates people to become heartless terrorists, able to defy the natural laws of survival by becoming suicide bombers or jihadists? Some theorists say that it is pathological, that is, people who become terrorists are predisposed to it because of their internal psychological makeup having some kind of abnormality. This theory however lost ground in the scholarly studies in the 1980s of the roots of terrorism. Renowned social psychologist Albert Bandura, summarized various studies of violence across human sciences, saying that propensity to violence or terrorism is a product of deeper historical, economic, or cultural forces over and above the individual. Atrocities are committed not by monstrous people, he said. Even decent, ordinary people can be led to do extraordinarily cruel things if the social conditions surrounding them are conducive. The studies say that people do not act in a social vacuum. What they think, feel and do are shaped by broader historical circumstances in which they are compelled to live and act. Some have said that Muslims have become alienated by the values and way of life of the West, driving them to commit such atrocities by way of vengeance.
In the Philippine setting, an article by Samira A. Gutoc, titled: Causes of Terrorism: the Philippine case, explains that poverty and the economic factor are the major causes of radical extremism in the Philippines. Sulu is one of the five poorest-of-the-poor provinces in the Philippines and it is inhabited mostly by Muslims. Opportunities are nil because of limited education due to the frequent disruption of classes on account of armed hostilities, as well as, the lack of investments. The political economy of Mindanao, the paper states, demonstrates how the power elite and multinational companies have developed mining and agro-industries in Mindanao through the years and yet, have kept the profits largely to themselves, leaving only a very small portion for the indigenous people to divide among themselves. Too, the share of Mindanao in the national budget has been measly despite the cost of war and hostilities, and without regard to the influx of Filipino refugees driven out by Malaysia.
There are a myriad of reasons on what motivates people to turn terrorists. In the Philippines, the problem of poverty in Mindanao is one and thus, must be addressed. There is a bright prospect that federalism could alleviate the problem of poverty and the desire of Muslim Mindanao for more autonomy in developing itself. Yet, there is no certainty that this will be a foolproof and lasting solution to terrorism. A disturbing conclusion in the studies on the motivation of terrorism is, this: what terrorists publicly profess as their reasons for committing such acts is often mere justifications when they are called to account for their acts. Sometimes people do what they do without knowing or understanding why, terrorism scholar John Horgan said. Curving or putting an end to terrorism the world over is therefore hazy and uncertain, the studies say. An all-out war on the Abu Sayyaf Group will not be enough. The task must be accompanied by socioeconomic and political reforms, together with education.
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