BATANG MINDANAW: Swerte ba jud matao sa sulod sa ilang balwarte?

DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 19 June) — For as long as I can remember, I was taught that I was one of the lucky ones.

I was lucky to have been born and raised in Davao. Lucky to live in a city where crime was low, the streets were clean, and people respected authority. Lucky, most of all, to have Rodrigo Duterte at the helm, the man my parents and so many others around me believed had saved our city from chaos.

I did not grow up with bedtime fairytales. Instead, I grew up with stories of transformation. At the dinner table, my parents would recount the Davao of their youth, a place they described as dangerous, dirty, and lawless. Then came Duterte. In their version of events, he fixed everything. He restored peace, brought order, and gave Dabawenyos something to be proud of. My father often said, “Kung wala pa siya, basin patay nata tanan,” half-laughing but always with a sense of sincerity. My mother, equally firm in her beliefs, would remind me to always be grateful that we lived in a place where leaders did not tolerate nonsense.

These weren’t just passing comments. They were values my family instilled in me: gratitude, obedience, discipline. To be from Davao was to know peace, and to have peace was to thank the Dutertes.

And for a while, I believed it completely.

As a child, I saw Davao through the filtered lens of family pride and local myth-making. I grew up with curfews, the ever-present “No Smoking” signs, and the knowledge that justice here was swift but not always gentle. My teachers told us we were lucky. My neighbors, proud. Every accomplishment of the city, every sense of order and safety, was credited to the man at the top. There was no room for questioning; only for gratitude.

I didn’t question these narratives. How could I? Everyone around me shared the same views. In family gatherings, my uncles would even praise the “iron fist” style of leadership. They would retell stories of criminals being dealt with swiftly, of drug users “disappearing,” and the supposed improvement of life for the rest of us. There was a tone of satisfaction in their voices, as if justice had finally arrived. If I looked uneasy, I was told not to be too sensitive. They would say, “Para man pud na sa kaayohan sa tanan”— it’s for the good of everyone.

I then internalized these beliefs growing up. I obeyed rules, came home before curfew, and knew better than to question things too loudly. In Davao, discipline was not just expected. It was demanded. You followed the rules, not because you always believed in them, but because not following them had consequences. I was taught that safety came at a cost, and that the silence of the streets was something to be proud of.

But it wasn’t until I grew older, and especially when I left the confines of those familiar Davao streets, that I began to sense the weight of what had been left unsaid.

I started noticing how afraid people were to speak out. Even among friends, there was hesitation in expressing anything that could be taken as criticism. I had classmates who whispered their discomfort, but quickly dismissed it out of fear. I met people who told different stories; stories of families who had lost loved ones in the drug war, of neighbors who vanished, of people too afraid to report injustices because the very institutions meant to protect them felt untouchable.

These were not stories I had grown up hearing, and they did not align with the city I thought I knew. But they were real. They were happening in the same streets I walked every day.

For the first time, I asked myself: how did I learn to equate peace with fear? Safety with silence? Was it truly peace, if it meant never speaking out?

The more I listened, the more I began to question the narrative that had been handed down to me. Was the peace we were so proud of truly peace, or had it been achieved by silencing those who had the least power to fight back? Were the clean streets really worth celebrating if cleaning them meant sweeping people under the rug? People who needed help, not punishment?

It was a slow, painful shift. Part of me resisted it. It is never easy to accept that the place you love, the leaders your family revered, and the system that shaped your childhood might not be as perfect as you once believed. But I also knew that loving something meant seeing it for what it truly was. Not just the good parts, but the hard, complicated, uncomfortable truths as well.

In conversations with my parents, I eventually tried to explain my growing discomfort. It did not go well at first. They were defensive. My mother insisted that I was being swayed by “biased media.” My father told me that I had no idea what the city used to be like. In their eyes, I was being ungrateful, rebellious even. For a while, it created tension between us. I felt caught between the family I loved and the truth I was starting to see.

Eventually, we found a fragile middle ground. We agreed that things were not black and white. That the good a leader does should not erase the harm they cause. And that maybe, just maybe, there were other ways to build peace—ways that did not involve fear or silence.

To this day, I wrestle with the pride and discomfort of calling Davao my home. I still love this city: its warm people, its rhythm, the smell of durian in the night market, the way Mt. Apo rises in the distance like a quiet guardian. But then again, loving a place does not mean agreeing with everything it stands for as well.

Now, when I hear the phrase “balwarte sa mga Duterte,” I no longer flinch, but I no longer nod blindly either. I recognize the power that shapes our city’s identity and the responsibility to question it. Because blind reverence, I’ve learned, is the most dangerous form of loyalty.

Living in Davao did teach me what discipline looks like, but it also taught me the cost of order when it goes unquestioned. It showed me that silence can masquerade as peace. And that sometimes, the hardest truths to confront are the ones closest to home.

Despite all this, I don’t write to villainize or erase the good that Davao has experienced. Instead, I write to understand. I write because I believe in the value of seeing the whole picture; not just the parts we are told to celebrate.

Being from Davao is complicated. It means balancing the pride of home with the discomfort of history. It means walking familiar streets with new eyes. It means holding both gratitude and grief in the same breath.

As I continue to grow into the kind of storyteller I want to be, I carry these contradictions with me. The world doesn’t need another blind follower or another loud critic who refuses to listen. What we need—what my city needs—are people who are willing to tell the truth. Even when it’s hard. Especially when it’s hard.

And maybe, just maybe, that kind of honest storytelling is what Davao needs the most.

(Allizah Keziah M. Manulat, 21, is a third year BA Communication and Media Arts student from the University of the Philippines Mindanao. She is currently an intern at MindaNews.)