Special Article
Muslim Struggle in Southern
Philippines II
By Dr. Mozammel Haque

(The first part of this article was published in our issue of December 2000.)

The current military operation in the Philippines against the Muslims in Mindanao has turned into ethnic cleansing. A bomb explosion caused a crater more than 20 metres wide and doctors discovered that the bomb contained toxic elements. The military has burned countless houses, madaris and mosques and looted Muslim property worth millions of dollars. In Metro Manila, the authorities caught 26 Muslims and charged them as suspects in bombing. Just recently, police shot and killed two Muslims near Quiapo Muslim centre, claiming that they were MILF members. The mandatory issuance of identification cards for all Muslims residing in Manila is also a violation of human rights.

There were “blatant violations” of the rights of the Muslims in the Southern Philippines, which, as mentioned earlier, include the imposition of an ID system for Muslims living in Christian communities, lack of concern of the Manila administration for more than 600,000 Muslims displaced by the fighting in Mindanao, desecration of their mosques, schools and homes by the armed forces of the Philippines, and the government’s encouragement of vigilante groups, who want to create a “Muslim-free” Mindanao.

“The series of human-rights abuses against some 14,000 families, or 76,000 individuals, in war-torn areas in Mindanao will remain unresolved, if the government fails to initiate peace with the Moro freedom-fighters,” a group of international and local human rights groups said on 17 July, 2000. The assessment is contained in the report of the international peace mission to Mindanao, which sent observers to the war-torn areas in July last. “Recent events have shown that there is no peace yet in Mindanao. Thousands of families continue to suffer from the destruction of their properties and lack of income because they are displaced from their jobs. Thousands of children are also suffering from diseases and are being deprived of their right to education.” Ditas Zurbano, executive director of the Ecumenical Commission for the Displaced Families, said the refugees are mostly in Parang, Maguindanao, Cotabato City, and Midsayap and Sultan Kudarat. She said that the displaced families, mostly Muslim, are being deprived of food and other assistance by the government agencies because they are suspected of being MILF supporters.

The military intentionally destroyed rice farms and corn plantations, treating the Muslim villagers as enemies. Once inside a Muslim village, they looted everything left behind by the fleeing residents. Muslim teachers were not spared these human rights vilolations.

Former President Fidel Ramos criticised the desecration of mosques during the military’s conquest of rebel strongholds and the raising of flags above the houses of worship. Marines were photographed planting a Philippines flag on top of a bombed-out mosque at the MILF’s camp Bushra in Lanao del Sur on May 30. Ramos said the last time a mosque in the Philippines was destroyed was in 1973, twenty-seven years ago. “Now the government is in a hurry to reconstruct the mosque. But why destroy it in the first place?” he asked.

The ‘all-out-war policy’ of the Estrada administration, aimed to wipe out the Bangsamoro people from the surface of the earth will surely fail. The Moros have survived the onslaught of the Spaniards, the Americans and the Japanese for almost four centuries. Certainly, they will also survive the present genocidal war against them. The government was wrong if it thought a military solution to the armed conflict in Mindanao would bring about lasting peace.

Solution to Mindanao Crisis

Military onslaught will bring no permanent solution to the Mindanao problem. It was attempted during the previous Philippine governments, but failed. When former President Ferdinand Marcos embarked on a war to crush the MNLF in the 1970s, he imposed martial law on the region. In the end, after heavy political and financial costs, and considerable casualties for the military, Marcos had to settle for a negotiated solution. There are three options to resolve the crisis: i) by granting autonomy to the Mindanao region, ii) adopting Federal Bill and iii) granting independence through negotiations. The first option was agreed but no attempt was made to implement it fully. Some Filipino legislators and Senators were thinking about the second option and were debating to amend the constitution in order to meet the peculiar situation of Mindanao. Other communities and religious groups are demanding to grant independence to Mindanao. First of all, let us see the pros and cons of each options and what the Government wants to do.

i) Autonomy: The Philippine Government may consider offering autonomy to the region inhabited by the Muslims during upcoming peace talks, if the Muslim separatists vow to cease military action. President Joseph Estrada’s spokesman, Ricardo Puno, said that giving self-rule to the stronghold of Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) under a four-point peace plan was among options that would be considered to bring peace to the turmoil-wrecked southern Philippines. “Autonomy is one of the areas being looked into,” he remarked.

Official sources also said that the package being considered was essentially an offer to expand the areas of self-rule now enjoyed by the Muslim minority in four Mindanao provinces of Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi. The MNLF, the main resistance faction, won the limited autonomy for Muslims when it ended a 24-year campaign and signed a peace treaty with Manila in 1996. The MILF and the smaller splinter group Abu Sayyaf refuses to recognize the peace agreeement and said it had failed to address the Muslim grievances.

It was under former President Fidel Ramos’s administration that Manila struck a historic peace agreement with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), in 1996. The peace accord led to the establishment of a four-province Muslim Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao. The agreement had provisions to include MNLF splinter groups like the MILF gradually into the peace process. But Muslims lament the absence of effective follow-up by his successor.

The four provincial governors of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) pressed for an end to the fighting and a return to the peace table. A letter signed by Governors of Lanao del Sur, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi and Maguindanao was sent to both President Estrada and MILF Chairman Salamat Hashim.

Less than four years after signing the peace accord with the Government, Nur Misuari, MNLF Chairman and presently Governor of ARMM, has revived his group’s campaign for ‘independence” for Muslim Mindanao. He said that the provisions of the 1996 peace agreement for Muslim autonomy had yet to be achieved. He called on the OIC to elevate the MNLF from an observer status to a full-fledged member which would serve as “the sole legitimate representative of the Muslim Filipinos.” He complained that the peace agreement was not fully implemented, and the first three years of the implementation of the agreement were a fiasco. He said, “The mini-Marshall plan of reconstruction of communities destroyed by war was not implemented at all, so there were failures.”

In view of this, the expanded autonomy that the Philippine Government wants to offer to the Muslims of Mindanao is meaningless. In the first place, it was offered under the barrel of a gun - the all-out war, a clear policy of subjugation. Any solution to the Bangsamoro problem that does not reflect the true sentiments and aspirations of the Moros, is bound to fail as all previous approaches did.

The MNLF leadership is now demanding the “immediate” establishment of the provisional government provided for in the 1976 Tripoli Agreement, which should be followed by the creation of “genuine political autonomy.”

The Arab News editorially summed up the situation in the troubled region: “The problem in the past has been that Manila refused to talk to the various Muslim groups together. Instead, it adopted a divide-and-rule strategy that culminated with the Moro National Liberation Front signing a peace treaty in 1996 and Nur Misuari being elected the governor of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). This left out the MILF and other disgruntled Muslim groups. In any event, ARMM has turned out to be a failure.” A Filipino Muslim lawyer, Atty. Abbas, pointed out that this was the fatal flaw of the Philippine Government in dealing with the Moros all along. When they negotiated a peace settlement with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in the 1980s, they told the MILF to wait their turn instead of including them in the talks.

ii) Federalism: There is suggestion for seeking amendments in the 1987 Constitution to pave the way for the adoption of a federal form of government for Mindanao. Three Filipino Senators filed a bill seeking to tackle the conflict in Mindanao and address the aspirations of its Moro minority. “I am (giving priority to) the federal bill as an institutional response to societal divisions and diversions in Mindanao,” Sen. Miriam Santiago, chairperson of the Committee on Constitutional Amendments, said and added that the federal solution may not only be appropriate “but also absolutely vital, to the problem posed by Muslim Mindanao.” She felt that federalism can provide an institutional mechanism through which the fractured Mindanao society could maintain unity and coherence.

Santiago described the Mindanao problem as a low-level conflict situation, but noted that the ethnic diversity and regional divisions in Mindanao call for a political solution. According to her, the federal structure has been adopted by at least one-third of the world’s population, including the United States, Germany, Australia, Switzerland, Malaysia and Canada. She hinted that the federal bill “stands an excellent chance” of passing the Senate, adding that the federal system “seems to be the only viable compromise between national unity and regional conflict” in Mindanao.

Chief government negotiator, Aventajado, said that autonomy was a more realistic mechanism for self-determination. “Federalism requires constitutional amendments and that will take time,” he said in Manila, where he briefed President Estrada on the talks. “Autonomy is an existing mechanism and we can offer this now to solve the hostage crisis. Autonomy is the first step,” he added. “Later on if we are ready to offer federalism, then that’s the time we can offer it to them.”

To federate or not to federate? That is the question to which Estrada has answered for now in the negative. He thinks that federalism won’t solve the Mindanao crisis. It may be true that federalism may not solve the Mindanao crisis, but neither will an “all-out-war” against the MILF. “As solutions go, the first, for all its faults, is better than the second. It at least recognizes that the roots of separatist movement are deep and won’t be cut off by a genocidal war masquerading as an effort to quell banditry,” wrote Conrado de Quiros from Manila.

President Estrada rejected as late as in June last a proposal to amend the Constitution so that a federal form of government could be adopted. Santiago said she was likely to recommend to the Senate the setting up of a constitutional convention to pave the way for a federal form of government. The Philippines already has a quasi-federal form of government, under the constitutional system of local autonomy. “It is alarmist and unintelligent to claim that federalism will cause disintegration. The Philippines has been quasi-federal for 10 years, but our country did not disintegrate. The US. Brazil, Australia and other federal states have not disintegrated. That’s a very shallow statement,” she said.

Presenting a socio-cultural analysis of the conflict in the South Philippines, Rep. Joker Arroyo said in the Lower House, “The Muslim Mindanao problem is a moral issue, not a structural one. It is one of attitude.” “For so long as Christian Filipinos continue to think and look down at Muslim Filipinos as a different kind of Filipino, that festering problem will remain,” he remarked.

Arab News editorially observed, “As for the MILF insurgency, the Philippine Government should sit down with them and talk about true autonomy. If the Philippines adopted a federal form of government, a Muslim province or state within the Republic of the Philippines could be formed. Within that Muslim province, Muslim Filipinos would have the right to order their lives as they choose to….”

iii) Independence: Filipino Muslims ought to be granted a separate state as they actually belong to another nation. An alliance of 300 non-government organization (NGOs) hopes to put pressure on President Estrada to stop his misadventure and listen to calls for a peaceful settlement of the separatist problem. Rasti Delizo, like many other Christians, said he does see the granting of a separate independent state for the Moro people as the only viable and lasting solution to the centuries-old conflict. He cited numerous formulae that were carried out by the Marcos, Aquino and Ramos administrations, which all miserbaly failed. “So why not independence for the Bangsamoro people,” Delizo said. “The country (Philippines) will continue to lag behind its Asian neighbours so long as the Mindanao problem remains unresolved.”

Mindanao Crisis Bill: Instead of thinking on the lines of these three alternatives, the Government is deliberating on passing the Mindanao Crisis Bill. As the dark clouds of a new war loom in the south, President Estrada is dreaming of converting Mindanao into an investment haven and the country’s food basket. The newly created Mindanao Coordinating Council prepares the groundwork for the proposed Mindanao Crisis Act, which seeks emergency powers for the President for the rehabilitation of war-torn region. This bill would give emergency powers to deal with the socio-economic crisis in Mindanao and also to undertake infrastructure and livelihood projects in the region. There is opposition to the move, however, from some parliamentarians.

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