THE MOUNTAINEER

Edison L. Baddal
Doomed MOA (2)

BONTOC, Mountain Province – Then and now, Muslims have always been suspicious of non-Muslims given their harsh experience with the colonials. To make matters worse, as Muslims were never subjugated up to now, they were alienated and discriminated from colonial times up to now. This situation runs parallel with the experience of the Igorots who are constantly at the receiving end of the discriminatory and haughty attitude of lowlanders.

Just like the Muslims, the Igorots, who were never subdued by the Spaniards and only pacified by the Americans, are perpetually sniffled and regarded with contempt by the lowlanders since Spanish times. Where Spaniards branded the Muslims of Mindanao as Moros, they branded the Igorots as savages, uncouth and ignorant.

Currently, this recalcitrant attitude is reflected in the actuations of Muslims towards the rest of the Filipinos, notably their Christian brothers, and is radiated towards the government itself which they generally regard as a foreign form of government whose principles and ideals are unfamiliar to them. In fact, the paranoid feeling of discrimination accorded the Muslims due to their Koran-based religion and culture by Christian Filipinos, is the main reason why the Muslim Islamic Liberation Front broke away from the Moro National Liberation Front when the latter forged a peace deal with the Ramos government in 1996 in order to continue the rebellion.

Secondly, the very idea of ancestral domain in MILF territory maybe vague to the Muslim rebels as it is perceived a contradiction to their aspiration of an independent homeland its inherent vestiges of control by the GRP. It is this corner’s conception that the MILF’s aspiration for an independent homeland should be devoid of any scintilla of political sovereignty from Imperial Manila no more no less. Hence, it is to be supposed that the grant of home rule, as intended in the failed MOA, is regarded as an anathema to their cherished aspiration of a completely independent Mindanao for the Muslims.

Thirdly, the type of Mindanao that they envisioned is one where they can live under a theocratic form of government anchored on the principles and ideals spelled out in the Koran. It is a type of government patterned after the theocratic-autocratic governments of the middle eastern Arab countries whose government are based on the principles laid down by the Koran.
It goes without saying that Koran is by all means the end- all and be- all of Muslim life. Most probably, this is the very reason why they refuse to recognize the authority of the GRP and also the Philippine constitution as the fundamental law of the land as it is only the Koran that they recognize as a law.

Hence, they perpetually chafe under the weight of a Christian government, which is at the most an infidel government for them, whose principles and ideals are contrary to Koranic principles and ideals. In effect, laws and regulations enunciated every now and then by the GRP are like eddying pools of water moving against the main currents of Islam, governed by the precepts of the Koran.

With the scuttling of the MOA, the ball is now in GRP’s hands to initiate confidence-building measures to force the MILF leadership to trudge back the path of peace. The GRP should be able to coax back the MILF peace panel to the negotiating table. But it should seriously consider the deeply religious and cultural roots of the conflict.

It cannot be denied that the roots of the Muslim rebellion is basically religious and cultural. At this point, the only advisable way for the GRP to effect a renegotiation of the peace process with the MILF is to neutralize the MILF renegade groups. When that happens, it will be able to steer the peace process on its own terms from a position of strength unless it is willing to have the territorial integrity of the country divided.

In the history of peace agreements, armistice and truce at various periods anytime anywhere, the dynamics of a peace process is anchored on mutual trust and confidence.. These moral forces having been vitiated presently between the GRP and the MILF due to violence, it will take a humongous effort for such to be restored on both sides.

But as territorial integrity is effectively sustained through politico-military superiority, it is incumbent on the GRP to show that it has the upper hand. Truly, the path to peace is arduous, winding, circuitous and treacherous but its dividends is worthwhile and priceless as far as achieving development in all its dimensions is concerned.