UNDERSTANDING BANGSAMORO INDEPENDENCE AS A MODE OF SELF-DETERMINATION

UNDERSTANDING BANGSAMORO INDEPENDENCE                                                                  AS A MODE OF SELF-DETERMINATION

[Paper delivered during the Forum on Mindanao Peace sponsored by the University of the Philippines in Mindanao Department of Social Sciences, the Philippine Development Assistance Programme and the Association of Mindanao State University Alumni on February 28, 2002 at its City Campus, Iñigo St., Davao City, Philippines.]

Abhoud Syed M. Lingga


Introduction
I would like to thank the University of the Philippines in Mindanao, the Philippine Development Assistance Programme and the Association of Mindanao State University Alumni for the invitation to share with you some thoughts on the issue of Bangsamoro independence. As a mode of self-determination, independence occupies, and will always occupy, space in the discourse on the Mindanao Problem since it is the core issue in the struggle of the Bangsamoro people for self-determination.
I am happy that this issue is given separate treatment in forum like this outside the circle of the Bangsamoro people. Discussion on issues of independence, autonomy and federalism in the search for solution to the Mindanao Problem will certainly contribute positively in the quest for peace in Mindanao.
Right to Self-determination
The right to self-determination is the collective right of a people to determine their own future free of any outside interference or coercion. It includes the right to determine their political status and to freely pursue their economic, social, spiritual and cultural development.

In the exercise of that right, people at one end can demand and pursue within the nation state more political power, active participation in the decision making and administration of government affairs, equitable redistribution of economic benefits, and appropriate ways of preserving and protecting their culture and way of life. On the other end, they have also the right to organize their own sovereign and independent state with the right to international recognition.
The United Nations declaration on decolonization states, “All peoples have the right to self-determination; by virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development”.
As a people, the Bangsamoro possess the right to self-determination. Both the Philippine government and the MILF recognize that right. Paragraph B (1) of the Agreement on Peace Between the Government of the Philippines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, otherwise known as the Tripoli Agreement on Peace of 2001, signed on June 22, 2001 in Tripoli, Libya, provides:
“The observance of international humanitarian law and respect for internationally recognized human rights instruments and the protection of evacuees and displaced persons in the conduct of their relations reinforce the Bangsamoro people’s fundamental right to determine their own future and political status.”(Emphasis supplied)
The use of the word “reinforce” implies that “the Bangsamoro people’s fundamental right to determine their future and political status” exists even before the signing of the agreement. Negotiated and signed in the presence of foreign dignitaries in foreign country made that recognition with international character.
The recognition of the “aspirations of the Bangsamoro people for freedom” (Paragraph B (2) of the above cited document) substantiates the legitimacy of their right to self-determination.
Having also a long history of independence in the same territory they now occupy and possessing distinct identity and culture, in the assertion of their right of self-determination the Bangsamoro people choose to regain their independence. Both the liberation fronts and the civil society movement share the vision of reemergence of the Bangsamoro state and government in their homeland
History of Independence
The historical experience of the Bangsamoro people in statehood and governance started as early as the middle of the 15th century when Sultan Sharif ul-Hashim established the Sulu Sultanate. This was followed by the establishment of the Magindanaw Sultanate in the early part of the 16th century by Sharif Muhammad Kabungsuwan. The Sultanate of Buayan and the Pat a Pangampong ko Ranao (Confederation of the Four Lake-based Emirates) and other political subdivisions were organized later.

By the time the Spanish colonialists arrived in the Philippines the Muslims of Mindanao, Sulu - Tawi-Tawi archipelago and the islands of Basilan and Palawan had already established their own states and governments with diplomatic and trade relations with other countries including China. Administrative and political system based on the realities of the time existed in those states. In fact it was the existence of the well-organized administrative and political system that the Bangsamoro people managed to survive the military campaign against them by Western colonial powers for several centuries and preserve their identity as a political and social organization.
For centuries the Spanish colonial government attempted to conquer the Muslim states to subjugate their political existence and to add the territory to the Spanish colonies in the Philippine Islands but history tells us that it never succeeded. The Bangsamoro states with their organized maritime forces and armies succeeded in defending the Bangsamoro territories thus preserving the continuity of their independence.
That is why it is being argued, base on the logic that you cannot sell something you do not possess, that the Bangsamoro territories are not part of what where ceded by Spain to the United States in the Treaty of Paris of 1898 because Spain had never exercise sovereignty over these areas.
The Bangsamoro resistance against attempts to subjugate their independence continued even when US forces occupied some areas in Mindanao and Sulu. At this time the resistance of the Bangsamoro governments was not as fierce as during the Moro-Spanish wars but group-organized guerrilla attacks against American forces and installations reinforced what remained of the sultanates’ military power. Even individual Bangsamoro showed defiance against American occupation of their homeland by attacking American forces in operation called prang sabil (martyrdom seeking operation).
Opposition to Annexation
When the United States government promised to grant independence to the Philippine Islands, the Bangsamoro leaders registered their strong objection to be part of the Philippine republic. In a petition to the president of the United States dated June 9, 1921, the people of Sulu archipelago said that they would prefer being part of the United States rather than to be included in an independent Philippine nation.
In the Declaration of Rights and Purposes, the Bangsamoro leaders meeting in Zamboanga on February 1, 1924, proposed that the “Islands of Mindanao and Sulu, and the Island of Palawan be made an unorganized territory of the United States of America” in anticipation that in the event the US will decolonize its colonies and other non-self governing territories the Bangsamoro homeland would be granted separate independence. Had it happened, the Bangsamoro would have regained by now their independence under the UN declaration on decolonization. Their other proposal was that if independence had to be granted including the Bangsamoro territories, 50 years after Philippine independence a plebiscite be held in Mindanao, Sulu and Palawan to decide by vote whether the territory would be incorporated in the government of the Islands of Luzon and Visayas, remain a territory of the United States, or become independent. The 50 years period ended in 1996 the same year the Final Agreement on the Implementation of the Tripoli Agreement was signed by the MNLF and the Philippine government. The leaders warned that if no provision of retention under the United States was made, they would declare an independent constitutional sultanate to be known as Moro Nation.

The opposition against annexation continued. On March 18, 1935, the datus of Lanao met in Dansalan (now Marawi City) and appealed to the United States government and the American people not to include Mindanao and Sulu in the grant of independence to the Filipinos.
Continuing Assertion
Even after their territories were made part of the Philippine nation state after it gained independence from the United States in 1946, the Bangsamoro people continue to assert their right to independence. They consider the annexation of their homeland as illegal and immoral since it was done without their plebiscitary consent.
The armed resistance of Kamlon was the manifestation of protest in response to the usurpation of their sovereign right as a people. And to show their strong desire to regain independence through all possible means, Congressman Ombra Amilbangsa filed House Bill No. 5682 during the fourth session of the Fourth Congress that sought the granting and recognition of the independence of Sulu, even knowing that it would not pass Congress since there were only few Muslim members. Then on May 1, 1968, Governor Datu Udtog Matalam of Cotabato issued the Mindanao Independence Movement (MIM) manifesto calling for the independence of Mindanao and Sulu to be known and referred to as the Republic of Mindanao and Sulu..
When it became evident that it would not be possible to regain independence within the framework of the Philippine nation state system, the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) was organized to complement the political struggle with military force. When the MNLF accepted autonomy within the framework of Philippine sovereignty a faction of the MNLF separated and formed the Moro Islamic Liberation Front to continue the struggle for independence.
Even the Bangsamoro civil society, through peaceful and democratic means, joins the campaign for independence. The 1,070,697 delegates to the First Bangsamoro People’s Consultative Assembly (BPCA) held on December 3-5, 1996 in Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao were unanimous in calling for reestablishment of the Bangsamoro state and government.

The Second Bangsamoro People’s Consultative Assembly held on June 1-3, 2001 at the same place, this time attended by 2,627,345 delegates from all over the Bangsamoro homeland, including representatives of non-Muslim indigenous communities, unanimously declared that “the only just, meaningful, and permanent solution to the Mindanao Problem is the complete independence of the Bangsamoro people and the territories they now actually occupy from the Republic of the Philippines.”

Bangsamoro leaders, headed by Sultan Abdul Aziz Guiwan Mastura Kudarat IV of the Sultanate of Magindanaw, meeting in Cotabato City on January 28, 2001 expressed their strong desire to regain the Bangsamoro independence. The Declaration of Intent and Manifestation of Direct Political Act they issued states:
“As sovereign individuals, we believe that the Bangsamoro people’s political life, as matters stand, call for an OIC-sponsored or UN-supervised referendum in the interest of political justice to decide once and for all:
• To remain as an autonomous region
• To form a state of federated union
• To become an independent state”
Bangsamoro, Not Filipino
The feeling of having distinct identity and culture reinforces the political consciousness of being separate from the Filipinos. Historical documents show that the Bangsamoro people have distinct identity. This was the reason why the US organized the Moro Province as a separate administrative unit to administer the Bangsamoro territories.

The MIM manifesto asserts that the Muslims’ culture and history are distinct from the Filipinos. That feeling of separateness is still strong until now as we can read in placards and streamers during rallies and demonstrations saying, “We are not Filipinos, we are Bangsamoro”.

Even the Philippine government acknowledges their distinct identity. The Tripoli Agreement on Peace of 2001 in several occasions refers to the Muslim inhabitants of Mindanao, Sulu - Tawi-Tawi archipelago and the islands of Basilan and Palawan as Bangsamoro people and they occupy a definite territory referred to in the document as Bangsamoro homeland. This was a total departure from the usual reference as “Muslim Filipinos” or “Muslims in the Philippines,” and “Southern Philippines” when referring to their place of domicile.

Democratic Approach
It now becomes clear to all of us that the fundamental issue in the Mindanao Problem that has to be addressed is the continuing assertion of the Bangsamoro people of their right to independence. No doubt that the problems of mass poverty, neglect and underdevelopment and other social inequities should ultimately be addressed but it should be after the issue on the political status of the Bangsamoro people is settled. It should be noted that all these economic and social problems had taken roots when the Bangsamoro homeland was illegally annexed to the Philippine nation-state.

In addressing this issue, there is within the democratic space a mechanism that can be used. The decision whether to be free and independent or not has to be made by the Bangsamoro people themselves. This can be done through referendum, a universally accepted means of settling political conflicts, like the case of East Timor. It is also resorted to in determining the will of the people on certain political issue, like when the Province of Quebec organized a referendum to decide on the issue of sovereignty, which would pave the way for the separation of the province from Canada.

The Philippine government and the MILF, as well as countries that witnessed the signing of the Tripoli Agreement on Peace of 2001, recognized the need for referendum as a method of peaceful resolution of the Mindanao conflict. The agreement provides:
“The negotiations and peaceful resolution of the conflict must involve consultations with the Bangsamoro people free of any imposition in order to provide chances of success and open new formulas that permanently respond to the aspirations of the Bangsamoro people for freedom.” (Emphasis supplied)
The document mentions of consultations, and referendum is the universally accepted method of doing it. It is the peaceful and democratic way to conduct consultations free from imposition.
To address all issues, it is preferable to widen the range of choice, rather than confine the choice to “yes” or “no” to independence, to include questions on whether the Bangsamoro people want to be free and independent, a federated relationship with the Philippines, a federated relationship with the United States as earlier proposed by the leaders during the American occupation, a federated relationship with any Muslim country in the region with whom they share common cultural, religious, political and social ties in the past, or maintain the status quo of autonomous relationship.

The referendum shall be held in areas where the Bangsamoro people presently occupy. This includes the provinces of Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi, and the cities of Cotabato, Marawi and Isabela. There are also towns in the provinces of Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, South Cotabato, Sarangani, Davao del Sur, Davao Oriental, Lanao del Norte, Zamboanga del Sur, Zamboanga del Norte, Zamboanga Sibugay and Palawan that should be included, subject for discussion with the people in the areas. Territories that will vote for independence shall constitute the separate independent Bangsamoro state.
The referendum has to be supervised by the UN in order to be credible in the eyes of the Bangsamoro people, the Filipino people and the international community. Common sense dictates that a party to a conflict cannot be credible to conduct or supervise such political exercise. The UN is the best body to oversee that the result of the referendum is respected and implemented. If there will be a need, the UN can organize its force to disarm those who will refuse to respect and implement the sovereign will of the Bangsamoro people.
Options for Christians and Indigenous Peoples of Mindanao
Although the whole of Mindanao, Sulu – Tawi-Tawi archipelago, the islands of Basilan and Palawan are the traditional homeland of the Bangsamoro people, the demographic reality is that they now share the territories with the Christian settler communities and the Indigenous People. In the spirit of justice and human brotherhood, the Bangsamoro people recognize the right of the two communities to self-determination. If they will opt to exercise that right and decide to secede from the Philippines and establish their own governments, the delegates to the Second BPCA commit to recognize and support any peaceful and democratic efforts to achieve that.

Having three independent states in Mindanao – for the Bangsamoro, the Indigenous People and the Christian settler communities – may be better because each can address the specific and unique needs of their citizenry. But being independent from each other cannot prevent them to cooperate on areas of common concern and matters of mutual benefits, like development of shared resource, in the fields of international relations, trade and regional security.
If the other two communities prefer to remain part of the Philippines then that decision has to be respected.
Independent Bangsamoro State
An independent Bangsamoro state shall be founded on the principles of freedom, democracy, equality of all men and women, respect to religious and political beliefs, and adherence to universal human rights.
System of Government
The system of government to be adopted shall be determined by the Bangsamoro people themselves. A provisional government shall see to the drafting of a constitution and to its adoption.
The constitution shall include a bill of human rights and freedom, and recognition of every region’s right of self-governance.
Rights of Citizens and Residents
Residents of the territory at the time of independence shall be the citizens of the Bangsamoro state. They shall enjoy equal rights, privileges and obligations. They will have rights to suffrage, ownership of properties, practice of their religious beliefs and participation in public affairs.

Residents who will prefer to remain citizens of the Philippines after independence can choose whether to remain as permanent resident alien or move to Philippine territory with the right to bring with them all their properties. For their immovable properties they can sell them to private individuals or opt for government compensation.
International Conventions and Agreements
The Bangsamoro government shall assume the obligations and enjoy the rights arising out of international conventions to which the Philippines is a signatory, in accordance with the rules of international law. Multilateral and bilateral agreements signed by the Philippines that directly apply to the territories of the Bangsamoro state shall be honored.
Special Relationship with the Philippines
Through treaties, the independent Bangsamoro state can have special relationship with the Philippines, like for example on development of shared resource, exploitation of resources to benefit from economy of scale, flow of goods and services, movements of their citizens, regional security, and other concerns.
Continuity of Laws
Laws passed by the Congress of the Philippines that specifically apply in the territory of the Bangsamoro state at the time of independence shall remain in force until amended or repealed by the Bangsamoro legislative body.
Pensions payable to retirees shall continue to be paid by the Bangsamoro government according to the same terms and conditions. Permits, franchises and authorizations that have been issued shall remain in force until their expiry.
Apportionment of Properties and Debts
The Bangsamoro government may conclude agreements with the Philippines on matters relating to the apportionment of properties and debts of the Philippines.
Win-win Option
A political commitment on the part of the Philippine government to allow the holding of referendum under the supervision of the United Nations after an agreed period of time to finally decide on whether the Bangsamoro people want independence or not will be a win-win option. It will ultimately resolve the Mindanao Problem since it will put to rest the issue of the political status of the Bangsamoro people. It will certainly redound to the good of the Filipinos and the Bangsamoro people because it will put an end to a war that causes the death of tens of thousands, displacement of millions from their homes, division of people and the drain of the economic resources of the Philippines.

If the budget spent to wage the war in Mindanao is spent for infrastructures, education and other social services, there will be more farm to market roads, bridges, school buildings for our children, hospitals and health centers, and more teachers to teach in the rural areas, and doctors and nurses to attend to the sick.
We should be reminded that sovereignty and territorial boundaries are not sacred that they cannot be re-configured. Historical events and contemporary realities tell us that sovereignty and territories shift from time to time whether through bloody wars or peaceful means. The experiences of the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia and other countries are recent to remind us that territorial boundaries can change to respond to people’s political aspirations.

Countries that respond to this aspiration without resorting to war develop tremendously, like the case of the separation of Singapore from the federation of Malaysia, while those who continuously deny the people’s fundamental right of self-determination suffer economic stagnation and remain nation divided.
Statesmanship of leaders are not measured on how bloody and how long they can suppress people’s right to freedom and independence but how they see through that these people enjoy this fundamental human right. History is never been kind to leaders who do not hesitate to use the might of the state apparatus to repress people’s aspiration to be free.

If the only road to peace will lead us to political division, without hesitation we should bravely tread that road. It is better to live in peace under two nations rather than to live in one nation without peace.

Déjà vu and Shifting Paradigms in the Moro Question

By Maulana M. Alonto

Déjà vu is a French term that literally means “already seen”. It has been adopted by English speakers to describe a feeling of experiencing the same event that had taken place in the past.

Indeed, the current deadlock in the MILF-GPH peace negotiations under the Aquino regime accounts for the déjà vu that many of us are going through today. We’ve seen and experienced this before. Not only once but many times under previous regimes of the Government of the Philippines (GPH) since peace negotiations with the MILF began in 1997 and were restarted with international community participation in 2001 after the Estrada all-out war of 2000.

In all previous impasses and deadlocks in the peace talks, nobody could have predicted where these snags led to. That is, until talks again resumed in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and everybody from both sides of the fence – not to mention the so-called NGO peace advocates - breathed a sigh of relief with the thought that ‘peace through dialogue’ had been saved and preserved.

There is, however, a big difference between what transpired in the negotiations yesterday and today. Except on one occasion, when the Arroyo regime went to war against the MILF in 2003 and subsequently secretly presented the latter with an ‘expanded ARMM’ proposition, which was of course rejected by the MILF, all deadlocks and impasses which occurred in subsequent negotiations were confined to the nitty-gritty of the political formulation mutually agreed and forged on the negotiating table.

Take for example the crucial period when both parties – the MILF and the GPH – were formulating the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD). The matter of Bangsamoro Ancestral Domain was no longer the issue when the MOA-AD was being deliberated upon starting in late 2005. Ancestral Domain was already a given because it is in the MILF-GPH Tripoli Agreement on Peace of June 2001 inked by the GPH and the MILF in Libya. Consequently, the oftentimes acrimonious debates on the negotiating table were not whether an agreement on Ancestral Domain had to come into being but in what form should it take. It took both parties nearly three years of painstaking negotiations interspersed with impasses, deadlocks and armed skirmishes on the ground before the MOA-AD could take form through consensus and initialed by both parties in late July 2008. However, when it was about to be formally signed on August 5, 2008 in Putrajaya, Malaysia, the Philippine Supreme Court issued a ‘Temporary Restraining Order’ that prevented the Philippine negotiators from proceeding with the signing. Needless to say, another war broke out as result.

The point is, in previous negotiations with bygone Manila regimes, the bone of contention invariably revolved around details, not on principle. And it was on details that snags occurred and violence on the ground was inexorably rekindled.

Peace negotiations under the regime of Filipino president Benigno ‘Noynoy’ Aquino III have, however, taken a different tract. The bone of contention no longer involves details – the so-called nitty-gritty - but principle. This deviation puts into question - which the MILF has correctly raised with justified concern - the issue of continuity in the peace negotiations. And it is this utter disregard for continuity by the Aquino regime that the principle which has evolved through 14 years of negotiations and consensus is being consigned to oblivion. This being so, a dangerous paradigm shift has taken place – a shift from what was envisaged by the peace negotiations beginning in 1997 and which produced that historic agreement in 2001 placing premium on political compromise that balances Philippine ‘national sovereignty and territorial integrity’ and Bangsamoro right to self-determination. Now the drift that this shift has engendered has made separation inevitable, which seems to be looming ahead in the horizon of the Moro Question.

How and why?

The MILF-GRP Tripoli Agreement on Peace 2001 is the basic document that provides the principle and direction-setting compass for the peace negotiations. It embodies the principle of balancing the Philippine state’s national sovereignty and territorial claims with the Bangsamoro right of self-determination. But in creating this balance - or compromise, if you will - the Agreement has required that the totality of relationship between the Philippine state and the Bangsamoro people be restructured and reconfigured to address historical and current injustices. This totality of relationship, when redefined, restructured, reconfigured and translated in concrete terms, would result in what the MILF has presented as its proposal: the Philippine state-Bangsamoro substate associative asymmetrical formula.

In other words, this principle of balance, which the Agreement has so ingeniously formulated ‘out of the box’, presents a political paradigm which both parties have agreed to by virtue of their having signed this Agreement in 2001 that precludes both perpetuation of constitutionally-mandated colonialism on one hand and the clamor for separatism on the other; but – and here’s the crux – it necessitates shared sovereignty between the Philippine state and the Bangsamoro people to be entrenched through the latter’s restoration of their historic identity and the exercise of genuine self-rule in what remains of the Moro ancestral homeland.

Unless one ignores totally or contrives to depart from this Agreement signed in Tripoli, there is no other political destination and there is no other end-result but to arrive at the state-substate formulation. This is what the whole shared sovereignty paradigm presents and what it is all about.

Unfortunately, this is the paradigm that the Aquino regime, in its counter-proposal to the MILF’s, has shifted away from. The GPH counter-proposal simply does not dovetail with the letter and spirit of this paradigm. Thus, the question of continuity is now very much at the heart of the discourse in the peace negotiations, which unnecessarily has prolonged the negotiation process and renders closure elusive. The question of continuity, or the absence of it, as a matter of fact, is the very reason why peace talks have stalled.

In presenting its counter-proposal in September 2011, which it calls 3-for-1 - not 3-in-1 perhaps as an afterthought because it may be mistaken for the instant coffee mix sold at groceries and sari-sari stores - the GPH has departed from this principle, and, therefore, the paradigm that both the MILF and GPH were guided by in the negotiations.

The GPH counter-proposal, to explain it very plainly, has a hierarchy of priorities at the topmost of which is Socio-Economic Development. The second priority is a ‘reformed’ ARMM that it is offering to the MILF. The third priority is rewriting history as a sort of remedial justice to the Moros who have their own colorful history of resistance to foreign colonialism and imperialism.

Putting economic development as a priority over the political resolution of the political conflict is, by its implication alone, suspect. It is suspect because counter-insurgency basically operates on the assumption that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. In short, the Philippine government not only hopes but believes its own theory that through massive infrastructure and economic development, such as housing for the internally-displaced persons (IDPs), roads, livelihood, etc., our people would eventually abandon their aspiration for the right to self-determination and freedom. This would, accordingly, presumably make them withdraw their mass support to and for the MILF-led struggle for self-determination and shift their loyalty to the ‘gobirno a sarwang a tao’ (government of the foreigners) in Manila.

The assumption that underpins this counter-insurgency gambit is very much flawed –as the Americans bitterly realized in Vietnam and are similarly re-discovering in Afghanistan and Iraq - in that it fails to take into account that factor of natural attachment to freedom so much so that even a well-fed bird imprisoned in a golden cage would not give up its longing to be free from captivity. There’s no doubt that many Moros would accept and welcome massive economic development but it will be the Moro politicians and elites, as usual, who will reap the pecuniary benefits accruing from such economic development. The Moro masses will eventually end up as bystanders. This is a systemic problem that can only be solved if the oppressive and morally-corrosive system perpetuating colonialism and its attendant problems such as political patronage, repression, criminality and political feudalism in the Bangsamoro is effaced.

Moreover, infrastructure development in a pre-conflict resolution situation will be vulnerable targets for any armed group opposed to government. The recent P3 billion worth of destruction wrought by the NPA guerrillas on the mining companies in Surigao del Norte is a clear example.

In arguing that the political resolution to the Moro Question should come first before any massive development could take place in the Bangsamoro, the MILF is taking the correct position. It is correct because it makes sense considering that without political resolution the conflict will still exist. Putting the ‘economic’ cart before the ‘political’ horse is a wrong proposition. But by insisting on it in its counter-proposal, the GPH has exposed its hidden agenda, which is counter-insurgency. It does not intend to peaceably solve the political armed conflict down to its roots through a political formula; it intends to solve it through massive economic bribery that it imagines would, in the long run, marginalize the MILF in particular and the Moro liberation movement in general. And this is where the Philippine government is dead wrong.

There’s no need to discuss further the second agenda in the 3-for-1 GPH counter-proposal, which is the so-called reformed ARMM, and that includes a new organic act for the same ARMM to be eventually renamed as ‘Bangsamoro Autonomous Region’. The ARMM is an instrument of the Philippine state through which it tightens, instead of loosening, its colonialist grip on the Bangsamoro people, and then cleverly clothes this sham with the garb of ‘autonomy’. As such, the ARMM is deliberately designed to be manned by servile Moro politicians who are the ‘favorites-of-the-day’ of an incumbent regime in Manila. As the Philippine rulers’ surrogates, corruption is one of their privileges. In this context, Michael Mastura, a senior member of the MILF Peace Negotiating Panel, was accurate in saying that the ARMM is “irreformable”.

In the drafting of the proposed new organic act for the envisioned ‘Bangsamoro Autonomous Region’, the Philippine state does not even want to concede to the Bangsamoro people the exclusive right to craft their own ‘autonomous law’. In its counter-proposal, the Aquino regime has come up with the lopsided configuration that membership to the body (‘Bangsamoro Commission’) to be tasked with the production of the new organic law shall be 1/3 chosen by the Philippine government, 1/3 by the MILF, and 1/3 to be mutually picked from the so-called stakeholders (meaning any Tom, Dick and Harry who the government decides is a stakeholder). Tingting Cojuangco, I’m pretty sure, who happens to have a house in a military camp in Cotabato and whose aspiration is to become the vice-governor of the ARMM would be glad to be appointed to such a body because she is a ‘Mindanao stakeholder’ residing in Forbes Park and a former governor of Tarlac!

That aside, the third priority in the 3-for-one proposal is rewriting Philippine history to accommodate Bangsamoro heroes who fought for freedom. This is the Philippine state’s convoluted and shallow idea of remedial and/or restorative justice for all the things wrong it has done to the Bangsamoro people. Rewriting history to right a wrong is a fine gesture but not enough. It has to be concretized in terms of deeds. And what better justice could the Philippine state and government give to our people than to recognize their right to self-determination even if this would mean political independence?

But the MILF is not even demanding for political independence. It is only asking for a substate status for the Bangsamoro people within the larger framework of Philippine statehood. Yet, even to this the Philippine government cannot accede because it is “unconstitutional”. So where is justice here? What purpose would rewriting history serve? Nothing.

But, of course, more funds will be coming in from international donors who are willing to underwrite the expenses for the symposia, seminars and conferences held here and there for rewriting Philippine history and integrating into it the Moro narrative. The result of all this, however, would be akin to how they now present our Moro indigenous cultures, folklores, and arts as ‘Filipino’. Just as the Moro Maranaw indigenous dance ‘singkil’ is now claimed to be ‘Filipino’ and is performed in the Folk Arts Theater, Sultan Qudarat would now be wearing the label ‘Filipino hero’ and painted portraits of him will be hanging in government buildings. In fact, of all the ironies that one could conceive of, a statue of him now stands erect in Makati, which is the bastion of the creole and mestizo elites of Philippine society, the Philippine state’s equivalent of New York City, and where their plush subdivisions and exclusive villages named after Spanish conquistadores (Magallanes, Legazpi, Salcedo, Urdaneta, etc.) and an American (Forbes) are located.

The Filipino ruling elites are, indeed, strange creatures. They are full of contradictions. They immortalize and, thus, honor foreign colonizers – supposedly their former oppressors - by naming their exclusive enclaves after them. Yet, they want us, Moros, to glorify their Filipino heroes who were never honored and immortalized by them in the same manner as the foreign colonizers are, and whom our Moro forefathers and their generations had never even heard of when they were resisting the Spanish and American invaders.

Ruminating further, these are the same Filipino ruling elites whose ‘illustrious’ intelligentsia, in August 1991, sat attentively and nodded their heads approvingly while Alfonso Felix, Jr., spoke before the Philippine Historical Conservation Society of which he was then president, and spewed all the venoms against the Moros that his mouth could produce. This bigot Felix likened the Moros to “reptiles” and a “snake” and recommended to the Philippine state that “…extermination is the best way to handle them.”

One could only conclude that the Filipino ruling elites have never ‘outgrown’ Spanish and American colonialisms. Inside their hearts, they’re still Spaniards and Americans though they can project, if their collective vested interests so dictate, the most patriotic visage of Filipinism that corporate money can buy especially when it comes to the Moros.

In any case, rewriting history to bring our Moro heroes at par or on an equal level with Filipino heroes is, to me, an apologetic approach, a ‘consuelo de bobo’ at best, to the age-old demonization (the moro-moro and zarzuelas and anti-Moro vitriol of modern Philippine media) that the Philippine state and the Filipinos had been heaping on the Bangsamoro people and their ancestors. There is no need to invoke history to tell the Filipinos and the whole world that our Malay Moro forefathers were not ‘pirates’ but freedom-fighters who took on the might of the mightiest colonial powers of their time. There is no need to boast that the Moro people collectively fought Spain as a de facto nation for more than 300 years while the Filipinos did so as a nation (and this is even questionable) for only three years – 1896-1998. There is no need to re-visit history to know that what our Moro heroes, our forefathers, fought and died for was not the same as the “cause” that Filipino heroes fought and died for.

Let me expand this little bit to make more things clear.

The foremost Filipino national hero, Jose Rizal, was shot by the Spaniards at Bagumbayan (Luneta) in December 1896 for a cause which he, Rizal, did not even believe and participate in and in fact denounced and renounced, which is the Katipunan-instigated ‘Philippine Revolution’.

The Katipunan was founded by Andres Bonifacio, a Spanish mestizo whose mother was the illegitimate daughter of a Spanish friar. The Bonifacio-led Katipunan never won a battle against the Spaniards since it made that momentous ‘Cry in Balintawak’ or ‘Pugad Lawin’ (nothing more than merely sound bytes really) or whichever in August 1896. And its political objective was nebulous: it did not call for the restoration of freedom and independence for the whole of the Philippine colony but only for the ‘Katagalogan’ – the Tagalog region. Any serious college student of history now knows this. There is so much confusion in Philippine history that its leading personas are also clouded in confusion. Creoles like Antonio Luna, Torres Bugallon, etc, who vehemently opposed the so-called Philippine Revolution against Spain but who later on joined it only when the ‘revolution’ turned against the United States of America after the Treaty of Paris in 1898 became Filipino heroes. To honor them, streets in Manila have been named after them.

Rizal can never equal Sultan Mohammed Dipatuan Qudarat. Sultan Qudarat knew what he was fighting for; Rizal did not. Sultan Qudarat was a Muslim: indigenous Malay in looks, attire, speech and thinking; Rizal was a mestizo Chinese, a Mason but Catholic-bred, European in manner and attire (he preferred to die before the firing squad wearing a European bowler hat and European winter clothes), Spanish in speech, and European in thinking. It is a mockery of the highest order to extol him as the “Pride of the Malay Race”. Qudarat was an avowed enemy of Spanish colonialism and fought it to the last breath of his life; Rizal exposed the abusive and corrupt Spanish friars in the Philippines because his family was a victim but he remained ever loyal to Spain and Spanish colonialism. Rizal wanted the Philippine colony to be a regular province of the Spanish Crown, not liberate it from Spanish colonial rule. In fact, when he was arrested prior to his execution in Manila, he was aboard a ship in Hongkong on his way to Cuba to join the Spanish colonial army fighting the Cuban revolutionaries.

How can they be equal to our Moro heroes who fought both Spain and America? No similarity there, I dare say! Sultan Qudarat and all Moro patriots did not die and fight for Filipinism; on the contrary, they fought and died for Islam and Moro freedom against colonialism and imperialism and what these two forces spawned today: Filipinism and the Philippine state.

We were free when the creoles, mestizos and indios - now called Filipinos – were yet fighting for their freedom in 1896. This was the logic behind why the Sultan of Sulu rejected the invitation of Emilio Aguinaldo for a joint partnership in the struggle against Spain. Yet, when the opportunity arose, the same creoles, mestizos and indios, through the military might of their American imperialist masters to whom they surrendered eventually, took away our freedom and independence and reduced us to colonial vassalage.

Summing it up, there is no need to create another myth like much of the stuff that Filipino history is made of because the Moro historical narrative can stand on its own historical truths. The Bangsamoro historical narrative is totally at variance with Filipino history. There is no meeting point, no convergence, because there is no commonality in cause let alone in ideology. Let us not delude ourselves. Philippine and Moro historical narratives are a history of collision – the collision between the Filipino, as a successor-in-interest to foreign colonialism, and the Moro who still fights for his rights and freedom.

If there is to be a rewriting of history, it shall be done by the Bangsamoro people themselves. And it shall be done when the totality of relationship between the Philippine state and the Bangsamoro people has been transformed along the lines of a state-substate relationship or, for that matter, when they become equal sovereign and independent states. This is restorative justice in its true meaning.

All in all, the Philippine counter-proposal is a far cry from that of the proposal of the MILF; they are so far apart, in fact, that they have been repeatedly described, even by our MILF Chairman Al Haj Murad Ebrahim, as like “heaven and earth”.

So is there any point of convergence between the MILF and GPH present positions? None on all of the substantial issues. On top of that, none on the matter of principle. The GPH under the Aquino regime has presented a new paradigm altogether that departs from the paradigm that both the MILF and the GPH had earlier fashioned with their consensus on the negotiating table. It never even mentions the Bangsamoro substate, whether in name or essence, in its counter-proposal.

This explains why the MILF Peace Negotiating Panel rejected outright this counter-proposal that led to the current deadlock.

Regardless, the MILF, in the spirit of the historic Murad-Aquino meeting in Tokyo on August 4, 2011, in which the parties agreed to fast tract the peace negotiations before President Aquino becomes a “lame duck president” in 2013 (his words, not ours), has submitted a proposal on how to resume and proceed with the talks despite the wide disparity in the proposals. This procedural proposal, as the term implies, is merely confined to the modality in approaching the comprehensive political compact. As such, it is not to be misconstrued as a new proposal that means the MILF is abandoning its substate proposition: the shared sovereignty paradigm. And this procedural proposal had been submitted through the good offices of the Malaysian facilitator in September for conveyance to the government panel and its principal.

Still, the GPH has not responded despite the passage of adequate time that allowed it to study the proposal. Not only that, Aquino remains averse to constitutional amendment. Even granting that the MILF and GPH would be able to ink a comprehensive political compact, without constitutional amendment to accommodate this agreement the peace negotiations, let alone the political compact, will all be an exercise in futility.

Meantime, people like Ameril Ombra Kato, driven by extreme impatience and frustration, not to mention agitation by agents provocateurs, are creating ‘problems’ on the ground. And this has been used as a ludicrous pretext by the GPH to allege that the MILF is disunited and therefore its position to speak for the Moro liberation movement and the Bangsamoro people is questionable. This, again, is premised on a wrong assumption. Kato and his followers do not even count for 2% of the entire fighting force of the MILF on the ground. And if we use the same argument on the GPH, how would it explain the dysfunction of the Aquino regime caused by the political conflict between and among the three branches of government? Should we stop talking peace to the Aquino regime just because it is in a ‘state of war’ with the Supreme Court and the entire Philippine judiciary? Were the MILF and the Bangsamoro people not the victims of this government dysfunction and disunity in 2008 when the MOA-AD was abandoned unceremoniously by the Arroyo regime because of the Supreme Court’s ‘TRO’? So far, we do not know of a similar ‘TRO’ being issued by Kato to derail the negotiations or whatever agreement that comes out of the peace talks!

As if done deliberately, the GPH, by its intransigence, flimsy excuses and foot-dragging, is stretching the limit of Moro patience to a breaking point.

The question is why given the oft-repeated official mantra that a peace deal between the MILF and the GPH will be concluded in the term of President Aquino.

A good guess is that the GPH has already made the paradigm shift back to counter-insurgency. A lot of reasons would account for this shift. But one reason that conspicuously juts out of the woodwork of the Philippine agenda is the discovery of the presence of oil and natural gas in the Bangsamoro territories. That’s why from politics, the obvious shift is now toward economics. It is economic considerations that henceforth dictate Philippine policies with regard to the peace negotiations. It is economics in the form of wholesale bribery that occupy the priority of the Philippine counter-proposal to the MILF’s substate proposal. Simply put, the ruling elites running a bankrupt Philippine state do not want the Bangsamoro people to have control over their newly-discovered natural resources. For this purpose, they have to remain a colony of the Philippine state but a colony that would have the trimmings of an ‘autonomous region’ that is the ARMM, albeit under a new nomenclature and a new organic act authored and crafted by the Filipino ruling elites and their surrogates in government.

This would also then explain the surge of Philippine combat troops in the Moro areas, their widespread deployment even in the most isolated areas of our countryside, and the sporadic military operations against MILF units, the remaining MNLF and other armed groups - particularly the ‘over-killed’ scapegoat Abu Sayyaf anarchists. By using one pretext or the other, the Philippine military is provoking war by a ‘show of force’ and encroaching on and occupying Moro territories despite the standing ceasefire agreement. There is sufficient reason to believe that an offensive war patterned after the Sri Lankan formula is a likelihood rather than a far-fetched conjecture of a conspiracy theory. Such a war provides the ‘hard power’ flipside to the ‘soft power’ side, which is economic development, of the same counter-insurgency coin.

It is axiomatic in human behavior or even in physics that for every action, a corresponding reaction ensues. Action begets reaction. Ignoring this natural law of dialectics, the Philippine state does not realize that a paradigm shift is not exclusive to it alone. The Moro liberation movement can also shift paradigm. If the Philippine state therefore has reverted back to counter-insurgency, what would prevent the Moro liberation movement from reverting, too, to its original aspiration for full political independence? This would bring us back to square one as it were before peace negotiations began in 1997. Probably the only difference is the presence and involvement of the international community in the Mindanao peace process.

We are far from being alarmists but in reading the situation we ‘see’ and ‘hear’ the sounding of the alarm bells. If we are to take at face value the recent briefing of the Philippine National Security Council wherein the MILF has been named as a ‘national security threat’ together with the NPA and the Abu Sayyaf, there is ground, indeed, for the alarm bells to be sounding. The renewal of armed conflict on a larger scale is not only a possibility but a looming reality as current trends in the peace negotiations continue.

Speaking in a tone of certainty, it will not be the MILF that will rekindle the armed conflict. The MILF is averse to violating signed agreements not only because it is a matter of Islamic principle, but also because it knows that the international community has its eyes set on the Mindanao situation. But some warmongering and hawkish quarters within the GPH and its military establishment with political and economic agendas of their own do not look at it that way and will only be too glad to spark a war even without the nod of Aquino. It happened before. It can happen again.

This is the déjà vu that of late we have been experiencing as the present deadlock in the peace talks drags on. It remains to be seen, though, whether this is just a passing phenomenon, like a brewing typhoon, or whether this is now for real. If it is for real, then a longer and more difficult struggle is ahead of us. In that case, preparation for the worst case scenario is not out of order.

Victory is not achievable without struggle and conflict. Again, this is the law of dialectics. Neither is freedom and peace served on a golden platter. The captive always has to fight for his liberation; short of that, he remains a ‘caged bird’ no matter if his cage is forged from gold. For, a just peace that emerges out of hard struggle is far, far more satisfying and authentic because it is liberating than peace imposed by the ruling colonialist power even if this is accompanied by ‘economic development’. There can and will never be a substitute for freedom. This is a truism whose relevance has defied time, race, nationality and geography.

The 14^th Century Scottish patriot and hero, William Wallace, once cried “Freedom”. In a different time, in a different land, in a different language, the same cry is heard: Merdeka!

-End-

AFP SOLDIERS RUN AMOK IN MARAWI CITY

SOLDIERS RUN AMOK IN MARAW CITY

MARAWI CITY, July 17, 2011-

At around 7:30 PM yesterday, 16 July 2011, a team of AFP soldiers in full combat gear belonging to the 65th IB of the Philippine Army swept the busy street of the Commercial Center of the Mindanao State University (MSU) Main Campus at Marawi City brandishing their high-caliber firearms in utter disregard of the civilian populace, who are mostly students, teachers and on-campus residents.

People were alarmed and panicked at what they saw. “It is if there was an on-going military pursuit operation. The soldiers were menacingly pointing their guns at us. One of them carried a K3 machine gun. We all ran and took cover in fear,” said one of the civilian witnesses to the incident who refused to be identified for security reasons.

Upon investigation by the MSU Campus Police, it was learned that the soldiers were stark drunk, angry and deliberately provoking trouble because one of them was mauled and wounded in an earlier incident; so they want to take their revenge on any Moro civilian.

The military rampage was triggered by an earlier incident. At around 5:30 p.m, same day, a soldier from the same AFP unit by the name of Pvt. Emilson C. Canonigo boarded a passenger jeep (Via ISIS Terminal) and took the front seat. According to the testimony of the passenger jeep’s driver, Pvt. Canonigo was drunk and appeared to be looking for trouble. Further according to the driver, Canonigo, whom the driver did not know at first to be a soldier, suddenly pointed his .45 caliber pistol at him (driver), told him to follow his (soldier’s) direction, and then demanded that the driver surrender to him his day’s earnings.

When they reached Barangay Biaba Damag near ISIS Terminal, the driver suddenly stopped the vehicle and grabbed the pistol pointed at him by the drunken soldier. As they struggled for the gun, it went off accidentally with the bullet hitting Canonigo’s right knee. The driver then asked for help from civilian bystanders who responded by subduing the drunk soldier and beating him in the process to disarm him. They then brought him to the Marawi Philippine National Police (PNP) Station, and it was only then and there that they found out that the armed holdup suspect was a soldier assigned to a Philippine Army detachment in Marantao, Lanao del Sur. PNP personnel immediately brought him to Amai Pakapak Medical center for first aid where subsequently army elements belonging to the 103rd Brigade of the AFP, the mother unit of Pvt. Canonigo’s outfit, upon learning that one of their personnel was in custody, rushed to the hospital and forcefully took him back to their camp.

There was an altercation between the PNP and AFP over the custody of the soldier but later the Marawi PNP acceded to the wishes of the soldiers.

It was later alleged by the soldiers that their comrade was a victim of kidnapping and robbery and pointed an accusing finger at the driver and the bystanders who helped him. However, this attempt to twist the story was dispelled by the fact that the driver and the civilian bystanders immediately turned themselves over to the PNP station and executed their affidavits and complaints against the said soldier. They also turned over the pistol taken from Canonigo. Besides, kidnappers would normally not bring their victim to the PNP station. In this case, the first thing that the driver and the civilian bystanders did when they subdued Pvt. Canonigo was to bring him to the nearest PNP station.

In a related incident, following the rampage of Canonigo’s army buddies at the MSU Campus, PO1 Jabbar Oaferina Lao filed a report at PNP Station Marawi stating that that day at around 8:45 PM at Brgy. Rapasun, MSU, Marawi City personnel of the Philippine Army discharged their firearms in front of his residence. He also said that the same Philippine Army soldiers kicked and hit his car and were under the influence of alcohol. He further averred that they were looking for trouble to avenge the earlier mauling of their comrade, Canonigo.

SAKSI Islamic Radio Forum, a civil society organization, condemned these series of related incidents and called on the authorities to investigate the matter and punish those responsible soldiers.

Meanwhile, MOGOP (Muslim Organization of Government Officials and Professionals), an International Monitoring Team (IMT) – Civilian Protection Component (CPC) member, is now documenting said incidents and will formally forward their report to the IMT-HEAD of MISSION OFFICE in Cotabato City.

Filed by Drieza Lininding, Marawi City

CARAVAN FOR PEACE (JUne 25,2011)

MARAWI CITY- More than 3,600 vehicles of various type joined the Caravan for Peace which was Organized by the Ranaw COnfederation for peace(RCP) last Saturday June 25, 2011, the highways connecting Marawi City and Iligan city to Lanao Norte to Malabang Lanao del sur, was the route of the said caravan. Vehicles with stickers,Tarpaulins and Flags which reads "Support the GPH-MILF peace talks and MILF COMPREHENSIVE COMPACT DRAFT" filled the road that caused heavy Traffic in the said Highways.

Participants boarding the vehicles that came from all walks of life of Moro communities braved the long and winding road and some even skip meals just to keep up with the caravan it took them 10hours of non-stop caravan. MUSA MAKABANGKIT chairman of SAKSI ISLAMIC RADIO FORUM and lead organizer estimates that more than 40,000 persons actually registered boarding the Vehicles not to Mention those Thousand of Moro spectators and bystander who welcomed them along the way waving Flags and Placards in Support of the said Caravan.

Abdul Sattar Sultan a MORO-OFW who just got home for his wedding was Amazed of what he saw: " I never thought that BANGSAMORO could be this United, this is Indeed a Historic event, this should serve as warning to the GPH to take the Negotiation with MILF seriously." he further warned that if the GPH-MILF peace talks fail then the BANGSAMORO people will rally behind MILF for whatever action they may be forced to do so.

Agakhan "BINLADEN" SHARIEF a Moro Activist appealed to the Filipino Nation to open up to the reality that a UNITARY state is no longer working, it will only hurt both the Filipino and the BANGSAMORO people.

The Ranao Confederation for peace also endorses the Idea of a Sub-state arrangement between the The GPH and a MORO state.

The GPH and the MILF is set to meet in Kuala Lumpur this 27,28 of this month.