No, the Filipino police do not speak French. Some do have a working knowledge, after diligently practise-conversing with instructors during their self-initiated thirty-hour leçons élémentaires, while most others are better off articulating their thoughts with las palabras en Español, from which a chockfull of Filipino expressions are formed.
Yet –et voilà!– in those predominantly French-speaking missions, the Filipino police still managed to perform as tasked: collocate with charges from la police locale, catch 'em zenglendos ou chimères, assist the Justice of the Peace in serving les mandats to arrest suspects, train droves of agents de sécurité électorale, and ensure the fair and free conduct du vote présidentiel, parlementaire, et ainsi de suite.
It was not easy at first.
Several years ago, Filipino peacekeepers who’d just arrived in the Haïtian countryside thought they were getting their first crack at street-level crime investigation, just like they did back home. Ambulant vendors were promoting their goods aloud, and if these locals only knew that shabu meant methamphetamine hydrochloride (or the illicitly smoked “ice” or “crystal meth”) in the Filipino vernacular, they would not have shouted, “Charbonne!” These peddlers should have tried pushing charcoal elsewhere instead, to avoid curious attention.
It would make a difference if the PNP Contingent urged national headquarters to revive the after-hours French language classes. This, if the Philippine police organization is really bent on substantially expanding its good-neighborliness efforts.
It must be noted that almost a third of the current UN peacekeeping operations around the world are set in French-speaking host areas, former colonies that could not hold down independence and territorial integrity. These missions thereby prefer UNPol who can communicate en la langue.
This year, as the Sixty-First General Assembly of the UN proclaimed through document A/61/L56, is the International Year of Languages. The idea was to raise the world’s consciousness on genuine multilingualism as a means “to promote unity in diversity and international understanding”.
The entire UN system recognizes six official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish. English and French are the UN Secretariat’s two working languages.
One does not have to be a certified polyglot to efficiently carry out duties, that’s a gaping fact. But learning and appreciating other languages make the shot at “world peace” less cumbersome –more fun, actually.
If the Khmer Rouge could only be interviewed at this time, they might tell us how well they communicated their thoughts on the Paris Agreement with the Filipino UN CivPol –in Tagalog, the Philippine lingua franca.
Anecdotes of that sort appear in GLOBAL PULISYA. Additionally, the book’s PART TWO: THE HEART ends all its nine sub-chapters in mini-epilogues, set against the background image of the sun rising on the PNP Contingent’s mission area. The text is spiced with phrases in the local language* and/or basilect, such as: Arrun suo sdey, Oth mien panyaha, Lespwa pou Ayiti, Bom dia de novo, Mire mengjesi, Dobro jutro, Hope done come, Sob bakhair, Sabah il kheir, and l’Espoir pour la pays. [Please refer to the Work-in-Progress Edition shots in the main site.]
The small effort is to celebrate the languages, to further the regard for cultural diversity, and to melt the barriers usually hardened by ignorance and inflexibilities, this year and perpetually.
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* For the crash-courses in Albanian, Arabic, Creole, Dari, Khmer, Portuguese, Serbian, and Tetum, the authors thank gracious tutors, including the 2005-06 Board of Directors, PNP Peacekeeping Force to Cambodia Association, Incorporated; Mr Roger Darlington of the United Kingdom; Monsieur “Menzanmi” Ernst, Mesdemoiselles Anne St-Fable et Gabrielle de Clarence of Haïti, Senhora Luciana of Brazil, and Captain Shuaib I Chaudry of Pakistan.
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PASS THE WORD. Members of the PNP Contingent employ interpreters or language assistants to perform their tasks on police administration, operation, investigation, and community relations.
[Photo by courtesy, Police Senior Superintendent Lester O Camba and Police Inspector Godofredo C Ergo.]
