MANILA, 15 November 2006 — Islam is viewed favorably by a majority of Filipinos, including those in the south of the country where Muslim extremists are active, a survey released yesterday said.
The respected Social Weather Stations (SWS) research group said a nationwide survey conducted from Aug. 5 to 22 found that 52 percent of respondents had a “favorable view” of Islam. Forty-one percent had an “unfavorable opinion.”
A similar survey in June 2003 found that 58 percent viewed Islam favorably while 41 percent had a negative view, the pollsters said in a statement.
Muslim rebellions have persisted in the south for decades and recent terror attacks by foreign and local militants have often pitted the Christian majority against Muslims.
In Mindanao (southern Philippines), 56 percent had a favorable view of Islam while 42 had a negative opinion, according to the 2004 survey. But in the Visayas (central Philippines), only 27 percent had a good view of Islam as against 69 percent who had a negative opinion. Last year, Visayan respondents also had a low 41-percent favorable opinion and 32 percent in 2002.
Respondents from the National Capital Region (Metro Manila) gave the highest favorable perception of Islam at 66 percent, surpassing even the favorable view shown by the respondents in Mindanao by 10 percentage points. Last year, 65 percent of respondents in the NCR answered favorably.
Religion Not a Factor
The findings were evident across all areas and economic classes except in the Visayas, said the survey.
There was also no significant difference between the responses of Filipinos who identified themselves as Roman Catholics and those who identified themselves as belonging to other Christian denominations. Fifty percent of Roman Catholics had a favorable perception of Islam while 54 percent of the other Christian denominations did.
“Religion is not a factor in having a favorable or unfavorable opinion about Islam, as no difference of opinion is recorded among Filipino Catholics and Christians,” the SWS said in a statement that accompanied the survey results.
The survey had a margin of plus or minus 3 percent at the 95% confidence level.
The also found that despite common traditions, 81 percent of Filipino respondents said that Islam was “very different from Christianity.”
Only 14 percent believed the two religions had “a lot in common.”
A similar survey in the United States in July 2003 found that only 57 percent of Americans consider Islam to be very different from Christianity, according to Social Weather Stations.
The Philippines is predominantly Roman Catholic with a significant Muslim minority in the South. According to the National Statistics Office, about 61.9 million of the 76.3 million Filipinos in 2000 were Catholic while 3.9 million were Muslim.
Observers have noted that while there are still many antagonistic elements among Christian and Muslim Filipinos, the number of those who believe in peaceful co-existence is getting ever bigger.
For instance, the number of Muslims migrating to the northern provinces of the Philippines have continued to grow.
In the northern mountain resort of Baguio, and even in the remotest places such as in Kalinga, Muslim merchants, mostly from the Maranao tribe of Central Mindanao, are being welcomed by the natives.
This growing acceptance of Muslims had been attributed to various factors, such as the continuing changes being adopted in the national educational system and in media to correct the misimpressions on Islam and the Muslim people, the bigger involvement of Muslim leaders in national undertakings, and continuing dialogues between Cahtolic and Protestants bishops with the Muslim ulemas.
Successive governments since that of President Corazon Aquino in have also adopted various ways of showing to local Muslims that they should not feel excluded as part of the Filipino nationhood.
In 2002, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo started declaring certain Muslim holidays such as the Eid Al-Fitr as national holidays not just as a gesture of good will to Muslims but also to inculcate among other Filipinos the essence of Islam. (Additional input from Inquirer News Service & Agencies)
