The Mindanao Examiner Regional Newspaper
Kusug Tausug, Jaycees hold leadership training, workshop
SULU – The Junior Chamber International-Jolo Jaycees and Kusug Tausug have recently conducted a leadership training and workshop for young people in Sulu province in southern Philippines. Shernee Tan, president of the Kusug Tausug, also thanked Jaycees for advocating nation- building and for continuously providing opportunities for young people to develop their leadership skills, social responsibility and fellowship necessary to create positive change – “just as what the mission of organization says.” The two- day workshop held recently in Jolo town was attended by Jaycees officials and members and students and their leaders from different schools in Sulu, including representatives of different sectors in the province led by Mayor Hussin Amin, among others. In her speech, Tan said in its history, the Jaycees set their eyes on a mission towards harnessing the energy and potentialities especially of the young sector of their movement in leaving a mark in nation- building efforts. She said just like the Kusug Tausug which for many years work on the same principle has now evolved from an inspiration towards a movement. “As Kusug Tausug’s first President, I do admit that I harbour a bit of apprehension and a lot of sleepless nights for the heavy burden of responsibilities placed on my young and fragile shoulders, and of course the dreadful thought of failure and making a mess out of a noble cause always enter my thoughts.” “Despite the selfdoubts, I was egged on by the fact that the Tausug youths of today are coming out from their individual shells to be noted as a viable and potent stakeholder of everything we are exerting efforts for in the present context. They are indeed the rightful inheritors of the future,” Tan said.
She said as a people, the Tausug have a glorious past and a colourful history which left an undeniable and indelible mark in this part of the world.
“We were once sovereign. My father – Vice Governor Sakur Tan - on many occasions said there is a lingering romance between our people and the past. And to consummate that romance, we should build a bridge between the past and the future if only to show to the people who look down and frown on us that we, too, can stand shoulder to shoulder with anyone in national endeavors as we are Filipinos too,” the young leader said.
“The Kusug Tausug will take the cudgel to be the bridge of hope founded and pillared by the honor and dignity our ancestors have fought and died for. We are not fomenting a rebellious movement or a reversion to a former order of things. What we hope to achieve in this humble movement is the reinvention of the Tausug– a new Tausug shaped by the struggle of their forebears and the awareness of the fact that we have to institute changes from deep within us that we may shred off the skin of a typecast that seems to have chained us to the ground unable to take the stride towards a better future.”
The current membership of Jaycees in the Philippines – from age 18 to 40 – is now 3,500, excluding active associates of past members numbering more than 6,000 and an auxiliary group of Junior Jaycees, numbering over 3,000 members operating in more than 300 communities across the Philippines.