DR. FRANCISCO PANCHO LARA JR. is Alert's Philippines Country Director. Pancho has extensive experience working in the voluntary, non-profit, and government sectors. Before joining Alert, he served as Philippines Country Director of the British volunteer organization Voluntary Service Overseas; he worked for the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, Philippines Office, as Policy Specialist in Agrarian Reform and Rural Development; and subsequently served as Chief of Staff of the Cabinet Secretary of the Department of Agrarian Reform from 1998 to 2001. He holds a BA in sociology from the University of the Philippines, and an MSc and PhD from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). He worked as a research associate at the LSE Crisis States Research Centre between 2007-2010; taught classes at the LSE Development Studies Institute between 2007-2008; and wrote on political economy issues in Indonesia and the Philippines for the LSE-IDEAS Emerging Markets Bulletin between 2007-2009. He has also taught at the University of the Philippines, and he has researched and written on diverse topics, such as the political economy of conflict, political settlements, economic sociology, agrarian reform, food security, rural politics, and agricultural trade policy. Pancho's latest publication is a co-edited volume on the links between Mindanao’s shadow economies, conflict and governance, entitled Out of the Shadows: Violent Conflict and the Real Economy of Mindanao (2013). (international-alert.org)

ATTY. NAGUIB SINARIMBO has served in various capacities such as consultant and resource person for the Philippine government and non-State actors as well as different NGOs and INGOs. He previously served as Executive Secretary in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) where he helped restore normalcy in governance in the province of Maguindanao and ARMM immediately after the infamous Maguindanao massacre. He led the final return of the 2008 War Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Maguindanao through the relentless pursuit of the Early Recovery Plan (ERP) of the Autonomous Regional Government. Also, he improved coordination and helped restore donors' confidence in the Autonomous Regional Government and pioneered transparency in the ARMM by establishing a website and the posting of budget and procurement project for the region. He is also currently the UN Senior Advisor on Political Transitions. (fef.org.ph)

A career bureaucrat, DATU ZAMZAMIN AMPATUAN is a civil engineer by profession and the first Muslim Filipino to attain the highest rank in the Philippine Civil Service. At 26, he was appointed by President Corazon Aquino as Director of the Department of Trade and Industry in Maguindanao (1989).  In the Arroyo administration, he served as Executive Director of the Office of Muslim Affairs, lead convenor of the National Anti-Poverty Commission, Administrator of the Southern Philippines Development Administration and Energy Undersecretary. He provided advice to government authorities post-Maguindanao massacre to ease the situation and its impact on the lives of ordinary people in the province. Datu Zamzamin’s parents served as municipal and provincial officials long before his father’s cousin, Andal Ampatuan, Sr., rose to fame and notoriety. Datu Zamzamin also served in international organizations as Programme Manager of the United Nations Multi-Donor Programme for the Southern Philippines Zone of Peace and Development and as Training Expert for the post-conflict project of the International Labour Organization to help former combatants of the Moro National Liberation Front. He represented the Philippines at the UNESCAP Committee on Poverty where he served as Chair for a one year term. Datu Zamzamin is a self-taught expert on Islamic spirituality and indigenous Muslim traditions. He is currently serving as Mayor of Rajah Buayan municipality in Maguindanao. (Wikipedia, MindaNews) 

DR. PAUL HUTCHCROFT is a scholar of comparative politics and Southeast Asian politics who has written extensively on Philippine politics and political economy. His research has examined state formation and territorial politics, the politics of patronage, political reform and democratic quality, state-society relations, structures of governance, and corruption. Paul's interests in Southeast Asian politics can be traced to 1980-81, when he first lived in the Philippines and witnessed mounting opposition to the rule of Ferdinand Marcos. This eventually led him into Southeast Asian studies at Yale University, where he completed an M.A. in International Relations and a Ph.D. in Political Science. He finished his dissertation while at the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies and proceeded to fifteen years of service on the faculty of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He joined the Australian National University (ANU) in August 2008, where he is currently a Professor in the Department of Political and Social Change. From 2009-13, he was founding Director of School of International, Political and Strategic Studies (now the Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs) in the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific. He has enjoyed many opportunities to live in the Philippines, including as the recipient of research fellowships from Fulbright-Hays in 1989, 1995-96, and 2003. (anu.edu.au)