FROM THE MARGINS
And just like that, May is here. When I was young, I remember that old folks called the first rainfall of May “Agua de Mayo” (waters of May), which is supposed to have healing properties. Amidst the sweltering heat that we are all experiencing, I really wish for that blessed rainfall to come.
May is a festive month, when many towns celebrate their ‘fiestas.’ It is also the season of “Flores de Mayo” (Flowers of May), a month-long devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the “Santacruzan” – a ritual pageant that honors the finding of the True Cross by Helena of Constantinople. I remember watching the procession of beautiful maidens led by the “Reyna Elena” during the “Santacruzan” in my hometown.
As a child, I loved May because it used to mean summer vacations. We would go to Barrio San Cristobal in San Pablo to stay with relatives. We spent our days fishing, swimming in the river, harvesting fruits, and enjoying “lupakan.” It was always a special time to bond with relatives and make new friends.
May is a special month for mothers. This coming Sunday is Mothers’ Day, and I pay tribute to all mothers, especially my wife, our female colleagues and all the Nanays of the Philippine microfinance industry.
Let me inspire you with the story of my mother, Olimpia Barte Alip, to whom I owe much of who I am today. She is a retired grade school teacher who is turning 91, but until now, she still remembers the names of her former students and whether they were diligent or not in school. A disciplinarian, she was known as a “terror” teacher but her students remember her fondly. Many of them still visit her, especially those returning from abroad. When I am introduced during events and gatherings in San Pablo City and people find out that I am her son, I am always received warmly. I can feel how much people respect her.
My siblings and I learned a lot from our mother. She used to bring all five of us to the public school where she taught. There, we learned how to socialize with other young children. During summer vacations, she taught us how to sell jackfruit (even its boiled seeds!), mangoes, and other fruits in front of our house. Those were my first lessons on entrepreneurship!
My mother was only in her pre-teen years when she started to manage her parents’ textile and grocery store. That is why her business acumen is very strong. Even my father deferred to her on important decisions, like where to invest and what properties to buy. From her, I learned the art of patient negotiation. It is probably her influence that made me into the prudent social entrepreneur that I am today.
Another strong woman and mother that I have had the good fortune to know is Mrs. Illuminada (Luming) Cabigas. She influenced a lot of microfinance leaders in the country, including me. As former Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) senior vice president, she was in charge of field operations and rural banking for small farmers, fisherfolks and their cooperatives. She was later appointed as president/CEO of the People’s Credit and Finance Corporation (PCFC), where she worked in tandem with the Microfinance Council of the Philippines (MCPI) to establish the regional microfinance councils in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.
Mrs. Cabigas celebrated her 85th birthday recently. Her party was attended by more than 500 guests. It was like a reunion of microfinance practitioners and LBP officials. I met my former professor and mentor, Pablito “Pabs” Villegas, Cords Cordero, and LBP’s first woman president, Gilda Pico.
I was honored to be invited to speak about our experiences in working directly with Mrs. Cabigas. When my organization was first given the license to operate a rural bank and until it was transformed into a microfinance-oriented rural bank, we invited her to be one of our board members. I will always remember her first opening message to our board. She said:
“In banking, you must protect the funds, especially the clients’ savings. Since your bank is a public institution, it should be trustworthy. You should adopt mechanisms and systems to ensure that there will be no fraud.”
This has been a guiding principle for us through the years.
Mrs. Cabigas was also the one who advised us to register our microinsurance business to separate it from the bank and protect the assets of both institutions. It was a great challenge for us since, at that time, microinsurance mutual benefit associations was a new concept that we had to introduce to the Insurance Commission. The rest, as they say, is history.
Mothers are our best teachers and sources of inspiration. They are the most beautiful flowers of May!
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“To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power.” – Maya Angelou
(Dr. Jaime Aristotle B. Alip is a poverty eradication advocate. He is the founder of the Center for Agriculture and Rural Development Mutually-Reinforcing Institutions (CARD MRI).)