The philippine state and moro separatism

THE PHILIPPINE STATE AND MORO RESISTANCE: DYNAMICS OF A PERSISTENT CONFLICT∗

In the last 35 years, the integrity of the present Philippine nation-state has been challenged by Moro separatism led by two major armed groups, the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

Armed conflict between the MNLF and the government intensified in the 1970s. Since then, three administrations forged agreements with the MNLF, a key feature of which was the institution of an autonomous regional government. The new initiatives and the democratic transition that took place with the end of the authoritarian regime in 1986 have not brought lasting peace to Mindanao. Today, the MILF has emerged as the major Moro rebel group.

Peace talks with the MILF began in 1997 but have been seriously marred by renewed fighting.

Other armed groups like the Abu Sayyaf operate in the region, resulting in a high degree of violence in recent years, and the revival of US influence in national security affairs.

Why does armed conflict persist in this part of southern Philippines?

To understand why, this paper will examine the nature and dynamics of this persistent armed conflict between the Philippine state and the Moro separatists. It will survey the developments leading to the conflict as well as the efforts that have been undertaken to resolve it. This wide scope is broken down into the following sections: Key Conflict Actors, Conflict Causes, Conflict Dynamics, Political Negotiations, and Regional Autonomy and Governance. The discussion mainly provides a situational analysis of the conditions that generated and sustain ethnic mobilization, but also puts emphasis on the role of human agents who have articulated and  This paper was published under the same title in Kamarulzaman Askandar and Ayesah Abubakar (ed.), The Mindanao Conflict (Penang, Malaysia: The Southeast Asian Conflict Studies Network, 2005).

1

acted on the perceived and obtaining conditions. A situational analysis looks at the historical, socio-economic and political conditions that generated and sustain armed political mobilization.

The human agents in this study include elites, counter-elites, communities and civil society groups. The interplay of conditions and agency has led to transformations of both the conditions and the agents over time. While the resultant conflict can very well be called in today’s discourse as “identity” or “ethnic” conflict because of the nature of the forces involved and their relationship and characteristics vis-à-vis the state, it is essentially a political struggle directed against the present construct of the Philippine nation-state and its main agents, the government and the military establishment.

The Conclusion identifies six major reasons for the persistence of the conflict through time, across administrations and amid changing national and global contexts. Briefly, these reasons are the failure of the state to provide a cohesive and cumulative response; the disappointing outcomes of development and redistributive measures arising from a host of local and national factors; the ineffectiveness of regional autonomy mechanisms to constructively channel competing political groups and elite factions; the continuing benefits from war conditions that accrue to certain vested interests; the lack of national consensus on achieving peace through peaceful means; and lastly, international developments that have complicated local-national dynamics.

The next section provides a background on the key players in the armed conflict, notably the Philippine state, and the major armed Moro groups.

KEY CONFLICT ACTORS The Philippine State The present Philippine state through its governmental instrumentalities that exercise political authority over the claimed Bangsamoro nation, and its coercive arms, notably the Philippine military, are the main actors making up one of the direct parties to the conflict.

2

The Philippine state has consistently adopted an integrationist policy over the Muslim population who, in the previous century, was gradually incorporated into the national political and economic framework. Integration consisted of recognizing and respecting religious difference, and providing special assistance that aimed to enable Muslim citizens to “catch up” with their christianized counterparts and effectively become “Filipinos” themselves.

Since the 1920s, Moro elites were accommodated into the political institutions of the state-inthe-making. This type of integrationist and accommodationist approach that began during the American colonial regime produced a new crop of secularly educated Muslim elites, most of whom initially came from the traditional aristocracy. By the 1950s and 1960s, the latter had learned to maneuver their way in the new political environment and succeeded in representing the Moro constituency in the national political arena. However, the encroachment of settler populations in Mindanao, land and population displacement, and the rise of new christianized local elites made their hold in their own bailiwicks tenuous 1. Social tensions in these localities eventually gave way to sectarian violence and subsequently, political mobilizations led by new Moro leaders advocated separatism.

State might was at its fiercest in the early to mid- 1970s in Mindanao. Muslim secessionism was one of Ferdinand Marcos’s justifications for declaring martial law in 1972. During these years, approximately 75 percent of the Philippine army, which had grown four-fold to become 250,000strong, was deployed in Mindanao. Fighting with the Nur Misuari-led MNLF never reached this scale of violence again. However, major military offensives launched in 2000 and in 2003 against the MILF, caused equally high levels of displacement and retaliatory violence.

From the 1970s up to today, the state under various administrations from Ferdinand Marcos, to Corazon Aquino (1986-1992), Fidel Ramos (1992-1998), Joseph Estrada (1998-2001) and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (2001-2004) sought to deal with the “Moro problem” largely by working through the traditional clan-elites. That is why the Bangsamoro story can be said to run on the two threads of collaboration and resistance, with a lot of overlaps or cross-stitching in-between. Government strategy, likewise was dual: coercion and cooptation. Regarding the latter track, the state sought to quell secessionism with offers of amnesty, regional autonomy and economic development. Political negotiations with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) were set in motion in 1976, 1986, and 3

again in 1992. Formal talks with the MILF began in the mid-1990s. Most of these initiatives were stymied by conflicting political and economic interests of directly affected interest groups and elites, and by the short-term and narrow perspectives of the political and military leaderships. However, the Ramos administration was successful in hammering out a comprehensive peace agreement with the MNLF in 1996, and in utilizing state instrumentalities to see through the MNLF’s integration into the political mainstream.

All in all, poor governance resulting from the state’s highly politicized and weak institutions has not helped build trust and confidence on the national government among the Moro populations, even as they count on state largesse to provide the much needed social services. From the perspective of these displaced and resentful communities in the periphery, the Philippine state is distant, alien and centered on the needs and interests of the national political center from where decisions are made. It is effectively a “Filipino colonial state”.

The Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) The MNLF and its military arm, the Bangsa Moro Army, was founded in 1971 by the young Tausug Nur Misuari, and other recruits of the defunct Mindanao Independence Movement who were given military training in Sabah. They included Muslimin Sema, Al-Jabbar Narra,

Dambong Sali,

Abdurahman Jamasali, Alaverez Isnaji, Hussein Mohammad, Al Caluang, and Al Haj Murad Ebrahim.

MNLF’s Nur Misuari was educated at the University of the Philippines at a time when the radical student movement witnessed a groundswell. He became involved in student protests led by the national democratic Kabataang Makabayan (“Nationalist Youth”), later on organizing Muslim groups and focusing on Moro concerns.

The MNLF’s 1974 manifesto, ratified in the First MNLF Congress held in Zamboanga, envisioned a Bangsa Moro Homeland covering Mindanao, Sulu and Palawan (MINSUPALA).

It castigated the

“oppression and tyranny of Filipino colonialism” and accused the state of “criminally usurping our land, … threatening Islam through wholesale destruction and desecration of its places of worship and its Holy Book, and murdering our innocent brothers, sisters and folks in a genocidal campaign of terrifying magnitude.” It promised to institute a democratic system of government.

4

The MNLF earned observer status in the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) in the mid-1970s.

In the 1976 talks brokered by OIC countries, notably Libya, the MNLF agreed to scale down its separatist demand to arrangements for autonomy.

The MNLF has since then witnessed several splits. In 1982, the MNLF-Reformist Group chose to collaborate with the Marcos regime. In 1984, Salamat Hashim formed the MILF, thus formalizing the break that took place in 1977 shortly after the signing of the 1976 Tripoli Agreement. A more recent split in early 2001 was partially engineered by certain government officials in the Macapagal-Arroyo administration. A 15-person group of MNLF leaders formed the MNLF Executive Council (also known as the Council of 15), which removed Misuari from the chairship and anointed him “chairman emeritus.” Misuari rejected the new post.

In 1986, the MNLF’s Bangsa Moro Army (BMA) was estimated to be 10,000 strong, and organized into 10 provincial armies. In addition, the National Mobile Forces were divided into four armies, and occupy at least 13 permanent camps 2. In 1994, the MNLF was estimated to have 14,080 fighters. The 1996 Peace Agreement enabled the integration of some 7,750 fighters or next of kin into the AFP and the police force. With the backing of the administration parties, the Lakas-NUCD-UMDP3, Nur Misuari was elected governor of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao in 1997 concurrent with his status and chair of the newly created Southern Philippines Council for Peace and Development (SPCPD).

The Estrada and Macapagal-Arroyo administration did not extend the same patronage to Misuari. Alienated, he convened the “Fourth Bangsamoro People’s National Congress” in Zamboanga City in April 2001 and declared a Bangsamoro Republic with him as President. After the new Organic Act for Muslim Mindanao (RA 9054) was passed in August 2001, the Macapagal-Arroyo administration supported the candidacy for ARMM governor of Parouk Hussein who belonged to the Council of 15.

Misuari then convened a Fifth Bangsamoro Congress in Jolo on 4 November 2001. Two weeks later, his forces launched simultaneous attacks on several army camps in Sulu and occupied the ARMM complex in Zamboanga City, taking hostage people in surrounding communities during 5

their forced retreat. Misuari escaped to Malaysia. In January 2002, he was arrested and subsequently deported and jailed in special quarters in Sta. Rosa, Laguna, a province south of Manila. Hussein won the ARMM election in November 2001.

Several meetings have taken place between the two factions and the MILF to work out differences, including the key diplomatic issue as to who will seat in the OIC representing the Moro people in lieu of Misuari. In May 2002, MNLF and MILF representatives signed a unity agreement in Malaysia, during President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s state visit. Both agreed that the Moro people will be represented in the OIC under one name, the Bangsa Moro Solidarity Conference. The government is equally interested in assuming a seat in the Islamic body.

In January 2003, a “Meeting of Muslim Leaders” brokered by Libya and supported by the government was held to discuss the MNLF’s leadership and attendance in the OIC meeting in Tripoli.

Four groups – the Nur faction (represented by Alim Murshi Ibrahim); former ARMM Legislative Assembly speaker Alvarez Isnaji’s group; the Islamic Command Council (a group of radical MNLF leaders who bolted from Misuari in the late 1980s and was implicated in the 1995 raid on Ipil which killed 70 people, represented by Habib Mujahab Hasshim); and the Council of 15 under ARMM Governor Parouk Hussein4 – attended the meeting. MNLF Vice-chair Hatimil Hassan and former director of the MNLF Foreign Relations Office in Syria was asked to act as chair of the “united MNLF”5.

The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) Salamat Hashim, a Maguindanaon educated in Egypt, founded the MILF. Coming from an aristocratic family, he was described as one who belonged to the traditional and religious elite unlike Misuari, who was classified as a secular elite 6.

Hashim belonged to the second batch of Muslim youth trained in Malaysia in 1972 and was the former vice-chair of Misuari’s MNLF. His group broke away from Nur Misuari as early as 1977.

They formed the MILF in 1984, and developed their bases largely in Maguindanao, North and 6

South Cotabato, and Lanao del Sur and Norte. In 1994, AFP estimated MILF strength at 5,420 fighters. In December 1999, AFP Chief of Staff Angelo Reyes claimed the MILF was 15,690strong, or almost 300% more than 1994 estimates. The MILF had at least one camp each in Basilan, Bukidnon, Davao del Sur and Tawi-tawi; two major camps each in Lanao del Norte and Lanao del Sur (Camp Bushra and Camp Ali), South Cotabato and Sarangani provinces; three major camps (Camps Rajah Mudah, Madirago and Usman) and several sub-camps in North Cotabato; and five major camps and 10 sub-camps in Maguindanao, including its general headquarters, Camp Abubakar7.

After the AFP launched its attack on the MILF in 2000, the MILF lost several camps including Camp Abubakar. Since then, the AFP has come up with conflicting estimates of MILF strength ranging from 5,000 to 15,200 – the latter based on the claim that they suffered a casualty of 500 men in the 2000 military offensives. In the 2003, the MILF camp in Buliok, in the vicinity of Lanao del Norte and Maguindanao became the target of renewed military offensives.

Intelligence reports allege that Al Qaeda/Jemaah Islamiyah operatives had based themselves in MILF camps; and that the MILF had received support from Osama bin Laden 8. The MILF denies these allegations. The MILF, in any case, has not been declared a terrorist group by the US. In July 2003, Hashim died. He was replaced by Al-Haj “Kagi” Murad Ebrahim, one of three deputies of Hashim and head of the MILF’s military arm. Murad was the chair of the Kutawato (Cotabato) Revolutionary Command of the MNLF when he left it to join Hashim. Murad has led the MILF panel in talks with the government. Unlike Hashim, he was secularly educated, with a degree in civil engineering from a local university. His father is an Islamic religious leader. Other MILF top leaders are Mohagher Iqbal and Ghadzali Jaafar, who were Moro student activists in the late 1960s like Misuari. Despite the current more secular leadership, religious leaders, notably ulama based in communities, remain influential inside the MILF. The Abu Sayyaf

7

The Mujahideen Commando Fighters, more notoriosuly known as the Abu Sayyaf, was organized in the mid-1980s by two young Muslim scholars schooled in the Middle East, Abdulrajak Abubakar Janjalani and Wahab Akbar.

Like the MILF, the Abu Sayyaf grew in the context of global Islamic revivalism. A good number of its recruits were originally affiliated with the MNLF, which shares its Tausug ethnic-base.

These recruits were reportedly unhappy with the leadership and compromises of their older revolutionary leaders, and saw greater promise in the language of jihad.

Other reports claim the Abu Sayyaf was penetrated by military agents who have since then colluded with the organization in numerous kidnapping, extortion and smuggling activities.

However, no official investigation has come up with this finding. The group saw a disintegration of its Islamic ideology and breakdown into several bandit groups after its leader Janjalani was killed. The current titular head of the Abu Sayyaf is Janalani’s younger brother, Khaddafy.

In 1994, the AFP placed the Abu Sayyaf’s strength at 407 identified members. The group hugged the limelight in recent years with their ruthless murder of kidnapped victims, and multimillion kidnap-for-ransom ventures of Filipinos and foreigners alike. The Sipadan, Davao Pearl Farm, and Palawan resort kidnappings, and the earlier kidnapping of priests and school teachers in Basilan and other local and foreign individuals working or living in parts of southwestern Mindanao, shocked public sensibilities and highlighted the Abu Sayyaf menace here and abroad.

The 2002 joint US-RP military exercises were conducted in Basilan and Zamboanga where the Abu Sayyaf operates. It was the first time the annual joint training exercises were held in a conflict area. In 2003, the exercise moved to Sulu, the main provincial stronghold of the Abu Sayyaf . AFP-led military operations in the area continue to search for an estimated 60 or so Abu Sayyaf members.

Intelligence reports establish links between the Abu Sayyaf and the Al Qaeda network. The AFP has also claimed that the Abu Sayyaf and the “Pentagon gang” are MNLF and/or MILF ‘lost commands” tasked with raising funds for the rebel organizations. Both the Abu Sayyaf and the Pentagon gang are listed in the US list of terrorists. The Pentagon gang is a similarly notorious 8

band of criminals but unlike the Abu Sayyaf, it does not have any ideological pretensions. Its known members are former Moro rebels and military/police scalawags 9.

1986

1994

1999

2000/03

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------MNLF

10,000

14,080

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------MILF

5,420

15,690

15,200

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ASG

407

60

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------*Various AFP Sources

CONFLICT CAUSES The underlying causes of Moro antagonism to the Philippine state can best be traced to the nature of the (colonial and post-colonial) state and its failure to equitably address the economic, socio-cultural and political dimensions of minoritization manifested in relative deprivation, cumulative loss of control over ancestral domains, human rights violations resulting from militarization, and marginalization in political processes and society in general.

A deeper understanding of the conflict will reveal its significant historical, social, political and cultural underpinnings. Historically, Muslim scholars and rebels have argued, Mindanao was annexed to the Philippine Islands forcibly and unjustly. The December 1898 Treaty of Paris between the United States of America and Spain incorporated the Sultanates of Sulu and Maguindanao and the rest of Mindanao to the Philippine territory ceded to the United States. It had no regard to the existence and sovereignty exercised by these sultanates long before the formation of the Spanish colonial state. American rule, nonetheless, was able to quell Moro resistance and secure the collaboration of the traditional rulers. The US government also denied Moro leaders’ objection to inclusion in the planned independent Philippine Republic.

9

Spanish colonial policies and interests such as the institution of the galleon trade that plied the Manila-Acapulco route saw the transfer of the political, cultural and economic center in the surrounding seas of the Sulu archipelago to Manila. Although it was a thriving center with developed political institutions that preceded Western penetration and the colonial state, the south ended up being the “backdoor” to the islands, and their sultanates relegated to the receiving end of the more dominant political and economic processes unleashed by colonization.

In this process of gradual incorporation and annexation across the islands into one polity, the Moro regions deviated from the dominant strand by the fact that their settling down as part of the new polity and identity called “Filipino” developed belatedly, or as some resistance spokespersons would claim, never. The “Filipino” nationalist resistance that culminated in the June 1898 Declaration of Philippine Independence from Spain

was distinct from Moro

resistance. The former was defined by a predominantly Tagalog and christianized leadership and participation. Since these groups owned the revolution, they also had the most claims on the resultant state. Consequently, the nation-building project was patterned after their own image (e.g., Tagalog became the national language). Resistance in the Morolands differed in time frames, historical nodes, methods, objectives, symbols and leaderships. They took place in territories that escaped the effective administrative control of Spain; that were not assimilated into the colonial culture, and therefore have retained their communal traditions, practices and belief systems. In other words, they developed distinctive characteristics that could not easily be assimilated into the new “national” framework.

Significantly, while landlessness has fed rural unrest in all parts of the country, the issue of landlessness assumed an ethnic dimension in Mindanao. This was because usurpation of land was legitimized by state policies that by the 1900s were already fairly well established and enforced in the christianized lowlands. Under Spain’s regalian doctrine, all lands became the property of the Spanish king. Invoking the regalian doctrine, the Americans declared even more lands public domains, forest reserves, mining and logging concessions and military reservations.

Meanwhile, private acquisition of lands was facilitated under a registration and titling system. In Muslim Mindanao, however, traditional property relations and customary land laws persisted and remained operational if not in law, then in practice, enforced by the traditional authority 10

structures that coexisted with the new political structures, and legitimized by the groups’ respective traditional/communal value and popular belief systems.

Ethnic differentiation and its politicization

were further heightened by the series of

resettlement programs initiated by the American colonial government and pursued by succeeding administrations. In 1903, Muslims made up 76 of the Mindanao population. By 2000, they constituted only 20.6 percent. Muslims remain the majority in only five of 14 provinces of present-day Mindanao, namely Sulu, Basilan, Tawi-tawi, Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur. They are a majority in only one city, Marawi.

Spontaneous and organized migration were encouraged as part of government policy to diffuse land tensions in other parts of the country, notably in Central Luzon where peasant discontent had given birth to a radical peasant-based social movement. Mindanao thus developed into a settler colony from mid-1900s onwards. Homestead arrangements for the migrants and the infusion of American and Japanese capital in the plantation economy in the region hastened the loss of control over land and tribute collection in the hands of the original inhabitants.

Estimated Moro & Non-Moro Population in Mindanao, 1903-2000 Non-Moro Moro

Population

Population Mindanao Year

Population

% of Number

Mindanao

% of Number

Population 1903 327,741 250,000 76 77,741 1913 518,698 324,816 63 193,882 1918 723,655 358,968 50 364,687 1939 2,244,421 755,189 34 1,489,232 1948 2,943,324 933,101 32 2,010,223 1960 5,686,027 1,321,060 23 4,364,967 1970 7,963,932 1,669,708 21 6,294,224 1975 9,146,995 1,798,991 20 7,348,084 1980 10,905,243 2,504,332 23 8,400,911 1990 14,269,736 2,690,456 19 11,579,280 2000 17,819,899 3,679,228 20.6 14,140,671 Sources: Che Man (1990); 1990 and 2000 Census (National Statistics Office)

11

Mindanao Population 24 37 50 66 68 77 79 80 77 81 79.4

Mindanao Muslim/Non-Muslim Population 2000 by Region* Region

Total Population

Muslim

Muslim

Non-Muslim

(%) IX - Western Mindanao 2,752,743 308,290 11 2,444,453 X - Northern Mindanao 3,216,540 186,405 5.8 3,030,135 XI - Southern Mindanao 3,670,651 98,332 2.7 3,572,319 XII- Central Mindanao 3,215,227 516,615 16.1 2,698,612 CARAGA 2,091,505 7,483 0.36 2,084,022 ARMM 2,873,233 2,562,103 89.2 311,113 Total 17,819,899 3,679,228 20.6% 14,140,670 *2000 Census population entries were recomputed according to current (as of 2002) regional

Non-Muslim (%) 89 94.2 97.3 83.9 99.6 90.8 79.4

arrangements where ARMM is made up of the five provinces of Sulu, Tawi-tawi, Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao and Basilan (except Isabela City).

Median Income by Region (2000 Census) Region

Median Income

(in Philippine pesos) Philippines P88,782 National Capital Region 193,092 Cordillera Administrative Region 169,768 Southern Mindanao (Region XI) 106,769 Northern Mindanao (Region X) 99,332 Western Mindanao (Region IX) 88,740 Central Mindanao (Region XII) 87,205 Caraga 82,857 ARMM* 74,330 *This data excludes Basilan province, which joined the ARMM only in late 2001.

Resentment today is sustained by objective and perceived condition of relative deprivation and victimization. The Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) is poorer than most of the country’s 16 regions. Average annual income in the region in 1997 was only approximately 60 percent of the national average, according to the National Statistics Office. Its median income in 2000 was roughly 80 percent of the national median, and only 38 percent of the median income at the National Capital Region. Only six out of 10 ARMM residents aged 10 to 64 years enjoy functional literacy, compared to nine of 10 in the National Capital Region.

The Philippine Human Development Report (2002) saw ARMM provinces at the bottom of the list of the country’s 77 provinces in terms of the Human Development Index (HDI) and the Gender-related Development Index (GDI): Lanao del Sur – rank 73; Basilan – 74; Maguindanao –

12

75; Tawi-tawi – 76; and Sulu – 77. The same report in 2000 showed high poverty incidences in ARMM provinces: Sulu – 92%; Tawi-tawi – 75.3%; Basilan – 63%; Lanao del Sur – 48.1%; and Maguindanao – 36.2%. The national average in 2000 was at 27.5% with Metro Manila’s poverty incidence at a much lower 5.6%. Oxfam reported that 85% of those affected by the 2000 fighting between the MILF and the government were Muslims, thus exacerbating poverty conditions among those who were already poor 10.

The Moro insurgencies are thus sustained by domestic inequities and state failure to provide redistributive measures. However, the armed conflict is fed by other forces and factors beyond what we have termed the “conflict causes.”

Below, under conflict dynamics, we will look at

other factors, events and forces that brought about and sustain the war, namely: landmark events, turning points or what may call conjunctural conditions for the outbreak of hostilities; the development of resistance groups and ideologies that were able to capture resentment and discontent; and other complications rooted in domestic and international politics.

CONFLICT DYNAMICS Conflicts give rise to new conflicts, making marking phases into pre-, actual, and post-conflict difficult. At best, one can identify key events and key actors that have fed the conflict dynamics.

The way conflict and resistance are articulated also feed into the conflict dynamics and therefore also need to be examined. Conflict is therefore a product of a continuous interaction among and within state actors and institutions, other social and political forces, and the natural and social environment.

Landmarks and Traumas (Key Events) The qualitative leap from resentment to armed resistance may be considered a product of accumulated felt injustices in the hands of the state and the dominant ethnoreligious majority.

However, specific conjunctures marked by violent landmark incidents – sometimes referred to as (community or national) “traumas” – provided the immediate impetus to organize and take up arms. They also helped shape the orientation and program of the resistance.

13

In Mindanao, the beginnings of the present armed Moro resistance are pegged to the 1968 controversy called the Jabidah Massacre. The secret operation called the Jabidah Project or Merdeka was believed to have been part of a plan by former president Ferdinand Marcos to invade Sabah, using a force of specially trained Muslim recruits. The trainees reportedly complained about delays in payment of their salaries and harsh training conditions on Corregidor island. Although they were told they could resign, several of them were instead allegedly taken and killed in groups11.

The execution of Tausug trainees recruited by the army for secret training galvanized Muslim resentment against the central government. The controversy was subsequently followed by violent land disputes and other social tensions in Central Mindanao in the 1970s-- thereby exacerbating the political conflict with the state to the societal and community level. Chaos was unleashed as Christian- and Muslim-led vigilante groups staged counter-attacks in the 1970s protecting their respective interests and often times acting effectively like private armies of powerful politicians or rich Christian/Muslim landowners. Although attributable to other factors like conflicting class and electoral interests (across and within ethnoreligious groups), securing arms became a popular recourse with the lines of conflict simplified -- in the press, by the state, and in the national/popular imagination -- as a “Christian-Muslim� divide.

Rise of Mobilizing Counter-Elites Oligarchic politics working through shifting alliances with the apex of power vested in the seat of the Presidency in Manila have concentrated power among elites outside of the Moro ethnic communities. The elites from the latter communities consequently lost out to the christianized Filipinos in the lowlands/other regions in the contest for positions in the political center and for accumulation of wealth through rent-seeking activities. Although political alignments have been dictated more by pragmatic considerations rather than ethnoreligious identity, and traditional Muslim elites generally collaborated with Christian Filipino politicians in fleeting alliances, as a group, Muslims have been disadvantaged in access to political and administrative posts. Moro elites who chose to live and compete in this system were merely subordinated partners in the fluid ties that bound the local with the national elites.

14

In general, traditional Muslim elites collaborated with the Filipino state by adapting to the logic of electoral politics, including the wheeling-and-dealing involved in intra- and inter-party politics12. Those traditional elites who were not satisfied with this relationship eventually bolted out and in varying circumstances supported, led and abetted anti-state activities. They provided the immediate leadership and/or material bases for mounting ethnic mobilization. Retired longtime governor of Cotabato province, Datu Utdug Matalam is a prime example. He is credited for founding in 1968 the Mindanao Independence Movement (MIM), the first post-1946 or postindependence Moro organization that advocated armed struggle, secession and the formation of an Islamic state.

Other than Udtog Matalam, other traditional elites who joined the armed movement in its early years were his son, Salipada Pendatun, Macapanton Abbas, Domocao Alonto, Rashid Lucamn, Abul Khayr Alonto, Yusoph Lucman and Yayah Sheik Moner 13.

In due time, these traditional elites failed to put up a sufficient and sustained defense against state penetration and societal encroachment, paving the way for counter-elites within the community to take over the leadership and further elaborate the identity platform. Thus was the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) founded in 1971 by Nur Misuari. Of the 13 members of the MNLF Central Committee in 1974, eight belonged to the secular elite (professionals and educated sectors of Moro society who did not belong to the traditional elite), three belonged to the religious elite, and only one (Alonto) belonged to the traditional elite while Hashim Salamat was listed as both traditional and religious elite 14.

But even as resistance now fell into the hands of new and younger leaderships, alliance with the traditional elites (the datus or children of datus in Mindanao) continued on the basis of perceived common convictions and/or mutually beneficial purposes such as buttressing each other’s legitimacy, strength and resources against the perceived enemy, the state.

Eventually, disagreements and dissatisfaction within the new leaderships brought about splits and the creation of competing organizations like the MILF over the same “ethnic� Moro constituencies.

15

Development of Resistance Ideologies As discussed earlier, the marginalization and impoverishment of the indigenous Muslim population in Mindanao resulting from the annexation, processes, and policies of a state led by christianized groups; and the minoritization and subordination in the socio-economic structures in favor of the Christianized settlers supported the formation of the deep cleavage defined by ethno-religious identity. The distinctive labels of “Moro” and “Filipino” -- although both products of overlapping/linked colonial experience -- captured this politicized ethnoreligious divide. In the second half of the 20 th century, the potency of the terms would be tapped to support a secessionist war, one that a Muslim scholar has described as more sophisticated than the “inchoate protests and pockets of lawlessness by Moro recalcitrants in the early and mid1900s15”.

As already noted, the armed conflict between the state and the Moros is not a “religious conflict.” “Muslim” and “Christian” terms are only derivatives of the Moro-Filipino fault line since the Moros consider being Muslim as integral to their identity and their being Muslims provides the least common denominator among the different Islamicized tribes that did not convert to Christianity. Equally, “Christian” or better still “christianized” is the common denominator of most other ethnolingguistic groups who have adopted the Filipino identity as a counter-discourse to Spanish and American colonialism. Such a Muslim-Christian cleavage does exists at the social level in the form of biases and prejudices against each other, and occasional communal violence16. And because resistance has been framed as jihad, has in more recent years increasingly been linked to international Islamic revivalism and transnational Islamic movements, and calls for an Islamic state have been raised, it is sometimes deceptively perceived as a Muslim-Christian conflict.

Rather than a war over religion, Moro resistance is basically a Bangsamoro (Moro people/nation) nationalist/national liberation struggle to free Muslims in the Philippines and their claimed homeland from Filipino colonialism and oppression.

In this regard, Muslim

resistance organizations have invoked the United Nations-recognized principle of the right to self-determination.

16

Beginning in the late 1960s, Moro organizations drew from historical antecedents to articulate the notion of a distinct Bangsamoro nationhood and, consequently, their desire to separate through armed struggle. The claims to a Bangsa Moro identity and Moro nation are founded on several grounds: common racial origins (Indo-Malayan); common religion (Islam); shared history (more than 300 years of resistance to Spanish colonialism to defend their faith, people and homeland); organized government in the form of the sultanates; and a defined territory (Mindanao, Palawan and Sulu)17.

It is notable, however, that the MILF has highlighted Islam as its organizing principle. This slant emerged probably as one way of buttressing the distinction between the MNLF and the MILF. The difference could also have arisen from the difference in background of their respective leading personalities; and/or

could have evolved alongside the global rise of Islamic

fundamentalism18.

The MNLF has thus been described as the secularist-nationalist-modernist stream of Bangsamoro resistance; and the MILF as the radical Islamic revivalist stream 19. While the MNLF had civil and military courts and a modernly structured congress, the MILF put up Islamicmodeled organs like the Supreme Islamic Revolutionary Tribunal and the Majiles Shura, and has framed its struggle as jihad20. The MILF-led movement is also distinguishable from the MNLF in that that the ulamas have played an important role in the mobilization of resistance. The ulamas play an influential role in articulating Islamic unity and laws “as an anti-thesis to familiar politics and social inequities”; correspondingly, allied Muslim professionals have formed organizations working for “Islamic unity and renewal” 21.

Because its basis of cohesion and consensus is Islam, the MILF has also been described as “exclusive”; it recognizes freedom of religion but is not averse to being described as fundamentalist22. In

contrast, the MNLF is said to be

“inclusive” in its conception of a

Bangsamoro Republic that is open to all Filipinos who choose to stay in the claimed homeland, and membership base that includes Christians and lumad (other non-Islamicized indigenous groups in Mindanao).

More recently though, MILF spokespersons have likewise spoken of the

“Bangsamoro” as all peoples living in the contested territory 23.

17

But while Islam has provided the alternative framework for resistance discourse and organizational structure, the political aim of national self-determination remains paramount for the MILF and its supporters. As the Declaration of the Second Bangsamoro People’s Consultative Assembly held in June 2001 put it: “(A)n Islamic ideological paradigm has become the framework of our vision to establish a new nation in fulfillment of that quest to reassert our right to self-determination and freedom.” 24 Complicating Factors While the armed Moro resistance is founded on felt and objective political, social, cultural and economic marginalization, the conflict situation in Mindanao is complicated by other factors and groups with their respective interests and justifications for continuing resort to force and violence.

On the part of the state and its armed forces, the use of force has largely been justified by the need to keep the integrity of the Philippine state and territory. One explanation given for the 2000 attacks on the MILF was the military’s need to withdraw recognition given by government to seven of 46 MILF camps during cease-fire negotiations 25. In his third State of the Nation Address in July 2000, President Estrada justified his war policy against Muslim rebels in the South on the need to uphold “the constitutional principle that the Philippines is one state, one republic, with one government, one military answerable to the commander-in-chief, under one constitution and one flag, in one undivided territory.”

After 9/11, war justification has been modified to include running after criminal elements and terrorists. Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes’ accusation that criminal elements were being protected by the MILF became the basis for the February 2003 bombings in Buliok, an area that straddles Lanao del Norte and Maguindanao.

Securing national territory and integrity may be a particularly strong orientation among forces trained under an

orthodox national security framework

and obligated to perform such

“national defense” purpose. Thus we will find generals and foot soldiers who strongly believe in the rightness of the military approach. Support for non-military means is actually seen only as 18

part of counter-insurgency. Thus, government has made attempts to break the ranks of the rebel movements through deep penetration of rebel ranks by military agents, cooptation, amnesty, and promises of economic development and livelihood assistance programs. State response has thus been described as the “ABCDE policy” -- that is, appeasement, bribery, cooptation, dilly-dally, and engagement 26.

But as already noted above, pristine belief in the cause of “national security” has not been the sole motivation for the preference for force, total victory, and the annihilation of the enemy in addressing the conflict. Other factors, moreover, feed into the dynamics of conflict.

Other groups sustain war to extract political and/or economic benefits. The military has traditionally raised the menace of communism and Moro separatism during budget deliberations in Congress. Military corporate interests naturally benefit from increased budget and foreign military assistance. Rank promotions are earned traditionally through combat experience. A situation of conflict, moreover, gives the military importance in national security matters, and vests them with influence over government decision-making. Such high profile roles in turn can support political ambitions of colonels and generals who do not wish to simply fade away.

Criminal activities also sustain war and are provided cover by war situations. People engaged in arms trading, smuggling, piracy, illegal logging and illegal trafficking of drugs, women and children, profit from conflict. Both government and rebel forces have actually been accused of complicity in such nefarious activities. The Senate has investigated one general and one colonel for alleged collusion with the Abu Sayyaf and recommended their court martial, a matter the civilian government chose not to pursue. Among the most serious accusations lodged by mutinous AFP junior officers in July 2003 were the sale of government arms and ammunitions to Moro rebels and AFP involvement in the bombing of the Davao airport in March 2003, which it had earlier blamed on the MILF. The first accusation is fairly common knowledge among military and civilians alike in Mindanao, where legally issued M16s are sold in the blackmarket at P25,000 to P35,00027.

19

Active and former members of Moro rebel groups, the AFP and the police have time and again been linked to various kidnap-for-ransom gangs and heavily armed bands of robbers. To exculpate their organizations from culpability, suspects are conveniently branded as “lost commands”.

External factors and forces such as the global and regional (Southeast Asia) Islamic revivalism and international solidarity movements have interfaced with and supported domestic rmed rebellion. The ideology, adventurism and material resources offered by extremist external groups easily appeal to marginalized populations. The situation is made more complicated by the porous networks cutting within or across clans, tribes and rebel groups. However, as noted, the conflict is sustained largely by domestic dynamics, the conflict parties’ respective agenda, and the rebels’ organizational integrity. The extent to which these external groups are able to establish themselves in the country will thus depend on how effectively the domestic agenda is addressed.

Finally elite politics and politicking likewise feed conflict dynamics. The February 2003 military offensive against the MILF in the middle of preparations for political negotiations was largely perceived as a political gambit of an ambitious defense secretary who was not only angling for more US military assistance but also aiming to catapult himself to senatorial if not presidential material.

President Macapgal-Arroyo’s shift from a strong pro-peace policy to a (domestic and global) war rhetoric in 2002 can be perceived as a strategic move aimed at earning political capital via a strong alliance with the United States. Also, it could be interpreted as an abandonment of leadership over internal national security policies in favor of

the defense and military

establishment. Because President Macapagal-Arroyo was put in power irregularly and with the support of then Estrada’s Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes, the president acted particularly beholden to him.

Elite factionalism, both at the local and national levels, and the lack of consensus on achieving a peaceful solution and the parameters for such, continue to confound the process. Non-Muslim politicians fiercely guard against any encroachment on territory or rights already in the hands of 20

the Christinized elites and population. They strongly objected, for example, to the 1996 Peace Agreement with the MILF. They mobilized protest rallies and distorted the content and nature of the agreement and the newly created structures like the peace and development council to enrage the christianized citizenry28.

As a whole, across sectors, no national consensus has been reached on the superiority of the peace process over war policy, although peace groups in Mindanao and the National Capital Region as well as the Christian churches in Mindanao actively promote the need for a peaceful settlement. A strong-arm approach against a minority force appears to find popularity among the majority in the conflict-affected area. This is evident, for example, in the rise in approval rating of President Estrada shortly after the AFP launched attacks on the MILF in 2000.

Peace-building political leadership likewise has not been manifested and sustained on the part of government and spurned rebel leadership like Misuari’s. As the next section will discuss in more detail, government policy on the Mindanao conflict kept shifting from one administration to another, or even within one administration. Only during President Fidel Ramos’s six-year term were political negotiations pursued assiduously. Nur Misuari, for his part, failed to show good leadership in carrying out the Peace Agreement and easily resorted to use of arms when the rag was slipped from under his feet by other forces, notably agents of the national political leadership.

POLITICAL NEGOTIATIONS Political negotiations have been undertaken across administrations to find ways to end the conflict and address what have been called its “root causes.”

On ways and means to end the conflict, ceasefire or cessation of hostilities, including disposition of rebel forces, are discussed. On the root causes, negotiating points that would make up the substantive agenda” are drawn up. These substantive issues cover the whole range of social and political reforms such as revenue allocation, land/ancestral domain, education and Shariah/customary law.

21

In all, finding an acceptable and workable autonomy has been the locus of political discussions with the MNLF. Key issues that made establishing a widely accepted autonomous government difficult to achieve were the area of coverage of the autonomous government and the manner in which this matter would be decided. Marcos and subsequent administrations (in accordance with the 1987 Constitution) required the holding of a plebiscite in Mindanao provinces and cities to settle the issue while the MNLF saw a process determined by majority votes as inherently skewed. A look at the various autonomy schemes and the consequent areas of coverage based on plebiscite results easily shows how the original claims over the “Bangsamoro homeland” covering Mindanao, Sulu and Palawan were whittled down to the remaining five provinces and one city where Muslims are still the majority.

Coverage of Various Autonomy Schemes Autonomy Schemes

Coverage (Provinces)

Original MNLF Proposal based on the concept

23 Provinces: Entire Mindanao, Sulu Archipelago and

of Bangsamoro Ancestral Homeland Tripoli Agreement signed 23 Dec 1976 in Libya

Palawan 13 Provinces: Zamboanga del Sur & Norte, Basilan, Sulu, Tawi-tawi, Palawan, Basilan, Davao del Sur & Norte, S & N Cotobato, Lanao del Sur & Norte, Maguindanao, Sultan

Presidential Decree 1618 signed 25 July 1979 by

Kudarat 10 Provinces divided into two sets: Region IX, Region XII

President Ferdinand Marcos Republic Act 6734 passed 8 June 1989 and approved by

4 Provinces (ARMM); Sulu, Tawi-tawi, Maguindano,

Pres. Aquino on Aug1989 SPCPD* based on GRP-MNLF 1996 Peace Agreement &

Lanao del Sur Original 13 (now 15) provinces covered under the Tripoli

Executive Order No. 37 (1996) Agreement.

Republic Act 9054 passed late 2001 5 Provinces, 1 City; ARMM plus Basilan and Marawi City *The SPCPD or Southern Philippines Council for Peace and Development is only a body under the Office of the President exercising supervisory powers over the provinces covered, not an autonomous government.

With the MILF, negotiations have so far focused on the cease-fire, and relief and rehabilitation, with ancestral domain identified as the third negotiating point. The format of the political component remains unarticulated. It remains unclear how the same territory can be parceled out to the different stakeholders.

The first attempt to find a political solution to the “Moro conflict” was undertaken by the Marcos regime in the late 1970s. It is argued that at this time some form of military stalemate 22

had been achieved. Moreover, the oil crisis made developing friendly relations with Arab countries important for national interest. Marcos thus established good relations with the OIC and Arab countries. The OIC and member countries like Libya recognized the MNLF as the official representative of the Moro people and gave it an observer status in the OIC. They also condemned the use of force in Mindanao. For the Marcos government to gain their friendship, it became necessary for Marcos to talk peace with the rebels. Autonomy – rather than secession – became the compromise solution between the Marcos government and the MNLF. With the OIC as mediator, the Tripoli Agreement was signed in 1976 by the two parties, marking the strategic shift from secessionism to autonomy. Marcos, however, chose to implement the agreement unilaterally and alienated the MNLF. 29 The different administrations after Marcos had different appreciation of these issues, how best to deal with the armed groups, and what could be achieved with the “peace talks”. They also had different capacities to unite the different arms of government (the legislature, military, civilian bureaucracy) under one policy approach, and had different priority agenda, as dictated by their needs for political survival and their appreciation of the issues of the day. Thus, the peace policy did not see continuity from one administration to the next; and efforts and achievements were uneven and not cumulative. Nur Misuari and the MNLF also always ended up pulling out of the talks or agreements.

The relative political stability during the Ramos administration made it imperative for the Presdident to move on to address economic issues. Ramos realized the difficulty of achieving economic growth without peace and order and saw the peace process as integral to his main economic development goals. Thus Ramos saw through the forging of the most comprehensive peace settlement in the country so far, the 1996 Peace Agreement between the government and the MNLF. The coverage issue was settled by creating a parallel structure under the Office of the President called the Southern Philippines Council for Peace and Development (SPCPD).

The SPCPD’s role was to supervise development initiatives in the (original) 13 Mindanao provinces covered under the Tripoli Agreement; while the ARMM’s coverage remained to be determined by plebiscite. The Agreement significantly enabled the influx of development programs in Mindanao funded by international development agencies and foreign governments who saw promise in the initiative.

23

Joseph Ejercito “Erap” Estrada assumed the presidency in 1998 without any peace program. He gave little attention to the 1996 Peace Agreement, and the structures and processes which it instituted. Under Ramos, negotiations with the MILF began and a ceasefire was put in place in 1997. In 2000, Estrada, upon the advise of AFP Chief of Staff Angelo Reyes decided to launch an all-out offensive against the MILF, thereby scuttling the process with the MILF, upsetting the development projects began, and creating massive displacement of people in affected areas, notably in Maguindanao and Cotabato.

Current president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (GMA) has an expressed policy of negotiations with the MILF. On the first month of her administration, she created an inter-agency committee for the relief and rehabilitation of affected areas in Mindanao. In March 2001, an all-civilian and allMindanaoan government panel for talks with the MILF was constituted and informal talks were held in Kuala Lumpur. The prospects looked bright until the focus got derailed by new policy thrusts after the 9/11 attacks on the United States.

In June 2001, the Tripoli Agreement was signed between the government and the MILF after a round of formal talks. The three main agenda items for negotiation: were set: the security aspect, in which both parties agreed to a cessation of hostilities; the rehabilitation and development aspect; and ancestral domain.

The Implementing Guidelines on the Security Aspect of the Agreement on Peace of 2001 was signed in the second round of formal talks held in August 2001 in Malaysia. The agreement called for the creation of the Coordinating Committee on the Cessation of Hostilities (CCCH); and of the Local Monitoring Teams (LMTs) composed of representatives of the government, the MILF, NGOs and the religious sector.

The Guidelines considered providing sanctuary to criminal elements a violation of cease-fire agreement. The government CCCH also assured the MILF that the MILF will not be a target of ongoing joint RP-US military exercises. It also asked MILF to make sure its ranks will not meddle in the exercises. The MILF proposed to adopt a “prior coordination system” which the GRP CCCH

24

put under review. Some 155 municipalities in 13 provinces were covered by the LMT organizing mission.

Beginning in March 2002, the process started to flounder. A meeting set on the second week of March in Malaysia was cancelled because of sporadic fighting the last two weeks, and amid published reports in American papers (Time magazine, New York Times) alleging MILF connections with Al Qaida. The military also accused the MILF of harboring Abu Sayyaf bandits; and that MILF attacks were mounted to recapture their camps.

In any case, several meetings still pushed through. In May 2002, in Cyberjaya, Malaysia, a Joint Communique on Criminal Elements reported on the agreement to isolate and interdict all criminal syndicates and kidnap-for-ransom groups, including so-called “lost commands� operating in Mindanao. Under this scheme, the AFP will convey to the MILF an order of battle containing the names and identities of criminal elements. An adhoc joint action group will be formed to pursue these criminal; it will work in tandem with the respective Coordinating Committee on the Cessation of Hostilities. A quick coordination system will be established by the GRP-MILF ad hoc joint action group to enhance communications and working relations. The MILF shall block entry of criminals in MILF areas and may request AFP assistance. These mechanisms were not put in place.

The Implementing Guidelines on the Humanitarian, Rehabilitation and Development Aspects of the GRP-MILF Tripoli Agreement on Peace of 2001 was signed in the same round of talks.

Respect for human rights and international humanitarian law was affirmed; the ARMM was identified as the primary agency for relief and rehabilitation; and the creation of an MILF implementing body (the Bangsamoro Development Authority) was agreed upon.

At the same time, Aquino began work as a key US ally in the Southeast Asian region in the fight against global trerrorism. An Agreement on Information Exchange and Establishment of Communication Procedures among the Governments of the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia was signed on the same months. Areas of cooperation under the agreement identified terrorism, money laundering, smuggling, piracy/robbery at sea, hijacking, intrusion, illegal entry, drug trafficking, theft of marine resources, marine pollution, illicit trafficking in arms.

25

Following bomb explosions in General Santos City and Cotabato City, on 9 May 2002 the president issued General Order No. 2 “Directing the AFP and the PNP to Prevent and Suppress Acts of Terrorism and Lawless Violence in Mindanao” and Memorandum Orde No. 61 “Providing Measures to Quell the Recent Acts of Terrorism and Lawless Violence in Mindanao”.

Two Joint Task Forces were established with the defense secretary in charge of the group deployed in Western Mindanao Area (ARMM, Reg IX [Zamboanga peninsula] and XII [Socsargen]) and the local governments secretary for Eastern Mindanao (Reg X [Northern Mindanao], Reg XI [Davao], and Reg XIII [CARAGA}). No reference to the agreement with the MILF for joint initiatives to combat terrorism was made.

Although the government stopped short of branding the MILF a terrorist organization, the twopronged policy of negotiation and anti-terrorism could not be sustained without policy tension.

Finally, in February 2003 the AFP led by Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes waged the offensive against the MILF in Maguindanao and Cotabato. The rationale for the attack was alleged coddling of the MILF of criminal elements. The MILF reiterated with counter-attacks that heightened the level of political violence for several months.

Attempts to resume negotiations helped deescalate the conflict. In mid-July 2003, preparations for the reopening of talks under Malaysian government mediation went full blast with government moving towards lifting of the arrest warrants issued against MILF leaders earlier in the year.

The US, while prudently declining to mediate the talks, pledged to provide

development and other forms of assistance to Mindanao. But two years were already lost since the fresh start of the peace process when Estrada stepped down; and only a few months were left before campaigning for the 2004 election would distract government officials and politicians from their tasks. Moreover, government and civil society organizations found themselves needing to spend more resources and energies to address the plight of the communities displaced once more by the war.

REGIONAL AUTONOMY AND GOVERNANCE

26

Republic Act 6734 or the Organic Act for the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) passed in 1989 put in place a regional autonomous government in four Mindanao provinces, namely, Sulu, Tawi-tawi, Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur. Republic Act 9054, which amended RA 6734, called for a new referendum in 2001 which resulted in the expansion of ARMM to include Basilan province and Marawi City.

The 1989 Organic Act for Muslim Mindanao is far better than what Marcos unilaterally instituted by way of a presidential decree after the signing of the 1976 Tripoli Agreement between the government and the Moro National Liberation Front. The 2001 amendment further improved on the original Organic Act (RA 6734) by providing more powers and functions to the regional government and legislative assembly such as to enact its own administrative and tax codes, and to create and maintain its own regional Department of Education. The Regional Legislative Assembly has since drafted its own laws adopting the provisions in the Organic Act as well as most of the other items in the Local Government Code.

The 2001 amendment also enhanced fiscal powers and revenue bases for the ARMM and correspondingly, its LGUs. For example, the ARMM gets to retain 100 percent of the internal revenue taxes collected in the region in the first five years of the amended Act’s implementation (2001-2006). ARMM will eventually retain 70% (which would then be divided equally between the regional and provincial/city governments). In addition, ARMM gets 50% of the revenues, taxes or fees derived from the use & development of the strategic minerals, and added share in value-added tax collections from goods and services.

Despite this added tax base, ARMM’s fiscal autonomy has not been achieved. ARMM provinces are the poorest in the country. Not only are tax collections low, massive investments in public services are needed to upgrade the standard of living, provide basic health care and education, and build the needed infrastructure to support economic growth.

ARMM”s dependence on central government grant is extremely high compared to other regions. In 1999, for instance, its actual internal revenue collection amounted to only P38.1 million but it received a total of P2,522.8 million or 6,621.5% internal revenue allocation (IRA) 30.

Yet, of the country’s total IRA in 1999, the ARMM received only 2% 31.

27

The negative consequence of this state of affairs is the continuing dependence of the ARMM government leadership on the national government and their need to court favor from national political elites to access funds, grants and other largesse, thereby abetting national-local political patronage. Former ARMM governor Nur Misuari was heavily criticized for his absenteeism in the region. Present Gov. Farouk Hussein likewise reportedly spends a lot of time in the National Capital Region. Both claim they needed to follow up budget releases.

The situation is made more volatile by the heavy militarization of the ARMM and surrounding provinces due to the continuing armed conflict between the state and the MILF, military operations against the Abu Sayyaf and the Pentagon gang, and the huge number of privately armed civilians.

Traditional Muslim political clans dominate the political posts at the regional and local levels of the ARMM. This situation has prevailed since the first autonomous governments were put up by Marcos in Central and Western Mindanao in 1979 32, and represents a continuity from the precolonial and colonial past. The ills flowing from this “clan politics� found in christianized areas can thus also be found in the region. More recently, a new leadership base are the rebel groups.

MNLF people who have garnered political and administrative posts, and revolutionary commanders who partook of development assistance that flowed from the 1996 Peace Agreement brought in their own personnel drawn from clan, tribal and rebel networks.

The ills of corruption so pervasive in the whole country is similarly suffered in ARMM. Former governors continue to be hounded by unliquidated expenses, charges of nepotism (and tribalism), and overall, have left a general impression of incompetent management.

It was also evident that despite what might be well-meaning initiatives to find a peaceful solution through political mainstreaming of revolutionary leaders, government efforts operated on patronage principles. Misuari’s governorship flowed from the measures undertaken to see through the 1996 Peace Agreement between the Government and the MNLF. He was fielded by President Ramos and ran under the ruling LAKAS-NUCD. Hussein, on the other hand, was the candidate picked by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

28

These former revolutionary leaders have not succeeded in making people feel that autonomy worked for them as a whole and not just for the coterie of people taken into the bureaucracy.

Corruption and lack of transparency, nepotism and overall lack of leadership and capacity did not provide a good case to support the autonomy cause. Typical of (christianized) traditional politicians, they perpetuated patronage-type of politics in their turf.

Women continued to be underrepresented in leadership positions. However, women were active workers in the Southern Philippines Zone of Peace and Development (SZOPAD) development projects. International development agencies and foreign governments have provided support for many developing projects under the SZOPAD and many of them have tapped Bangsamoro women’s organizations for project implementation.

On the whole, the human development indicators above show that after more than a decade of autonomous government, poverty continues to be the lot of the Muslim provinces. The autonomous structure in itself has not provided the resource nor mechanism to address other factors like lack of capacity, bad governance practices, and the continuing armed conflicts in the region that sustain impoverishment. Moreover, since the MILF was not part of the process that instituted the ARMM, they do not see it as a response to their demands. A political solution to MILF demands for self-rule has yet to be designed. As it is, the territorial coverage of a prospective self-government for MILF constituents overlap with that of the existing autonomous region whose regional leadership is now the turf of MNLF-affiliated leaders.

Federalism , it is argued, can reconcile the political autonomy demands of the MNLF and the MILF since it can allow for a redrawing of current provincial, municipal down to the village boundaries. This option would of course require constitutional amendment. Moreover, to be the solution to Moro separatism, the process of transforming regional arrangements including a shift to a federal system and the content and contours of such transformation should involve Moro civil society and the two revolutionary groups at the onset, not to mention the other stakeholders in the affected communities. Otherwise, like the ARMM governments, it will fail to get the consensus and cooperation of all important players.

29

CONCLUSION The current conflict in Mindanao is a product of historical developments that were brought about by policies adopted by the colonial and post-colonial Philippine states, and the nature of the current Philippine state as “Filipino”, weak and corrupted. Such a process of over a hundred years produced a complex situation marked by socio-economic marginalization and political alienation of the Moro populations. These inequities and repressive measures instituted by the state provided conditions for ethno-religious nationalist ideologies and armed resistance organizations led by counter-elites to flourish.

Today, the current conflict in Mindanao persists because of the developments and complicating factors discussed above. Below is an attempt to synthesize these factors into a set of explanations:



Incoherent peace policy and absence of peace-building leadership . Despite the evident difficulty in quashing rebellion using military force, government political leadership lacked clarity and consistency in pursuing a peace policy. Different administrations had their respective thrusts and operated on certain constraints. Thus the efforts at instituting reforms on the ground and pursuing political negotiations to its logical end were not cumulatively sustained because of this government’s lack of cohesion and clarity of purpose.

There is clearly an absence of peace-building leadership at the national level where the national policy is decided and implemented. Rebel leaders, on the other hand, generally respond correspondingly to the predisposition of the incumbent administration, in effect showing a willingness to compromise. But the recurring wars and breakdowns in the negotiations, and dissatisfaction with government’s actions, have pushed incumbent leaders to likewise take extreme action which in turn have justified tougher government policy.

There is also danger that extremists will capture rebel leadership posts, or that the protracted conflict will cause fissures within the organization arising from policy differences thereby making the conflict more intractable.

30

In all, the peace process suffers from intermittent and costly retrogressions, where gains in previous periods are eroded by the burden of war and its polarizing impact.



Poor governance, patronage and continuing underdevelopment . National government as well as local government have yet to bring about more lasting and sustainable redistributive measures to address the social and economic contexts of resistance and discontent. Lack of coordination, patronage politics and corruption have stunted economic development and economic reform measures despite the fact that the national political leadership has acknowledged the need to address the economic difficulties in the region and several government agencies are in place to oversee government programs.

Local government officials are characterized by a high degree of absenteeism with many mayors staying in capital towns of provinces 33 where important political bargaining takes place. Provincial and regional officials tend to look for alliances with national-level counterparts to buttress their own positions, and enable them to access funds and opportunities at the discretion of the national government/officials. Thus, despite local and regional autonomy, the highly politicized governance processes and center-subordinate relations among national-local political elites have not enabled greater local initiative and independence to institute viable and redistributive measures. The problem is exacerbated by the fact of fiscal dependence on the national government given the low-income status of these government units.

Local datus and other traditional community leaders also remain influential in determining access to resources. A case in point is the complaint aired by ordinary community folk that most beneficiaries of the Department of Social Welfare and Development housing programs were laborers of datus and friends and relatives of municipal officers 34.

The rise of reform-oriented civil society initiatives in the affected region in the last 10 years, especially with funding from international agencies encouraged by the 1996 Peace Agreement, could not compensate for the inherent weaknesses in the development processes arising from the social and political structures. Indeed, this is an old story, a pattern already established since the American government began Filipinization of the

31

civilian administration in the country and in Mindanao 35. Moreover, the recurring pattern of outbreaks of war in between relative peace, have time and again shifted development initiatives to relief and rehabilitation aimed at restoring the communities, livelihoods and psychological well-being that were destroyed by the latest round of political violence.



Failure of the ARMM as a mechanism for peaceful political competition, good governance and quality leadership selection. Existing regional autonomy structures and mechanisms have not been able to effectively channel competing political agenda of different groups (the different rebel forces, local/provincial/ regional Christian and Muslim political elites, national elites).

The regional government is largely held captive by the national political leadership – whoever the latter supports will get the top posts. When the MNLF rejected the proffers of regional autonomy in 1989, the regional and provincial governorship went to the competing traditional elites. With MNLF’s Misuari taken into the fold, and later Parouk Hussein, the regional governorship went to the rebel leadership. But, in general, local governments continue to be the domain of the old competing political clans, with their respective allies among national powerbrokers.

This dependence on national patronage and lack of authenticity as a mechanism that provides an even playing field among political contenders (inter-clan, inter-class, inter-tribal, inter-religious), aside from fiscal constraints and lack of capacity, gives the institution a permanent yet transitory nature. Meaning, it is good for whoever is in power; other factions work with or around it and try to capture it for themselves eventually. But in itself, it does not provide a sustained and cumulative function of good governance and quality leadership selection.

While various elite and rebel factions vigorously contest the ARMM posts and congressional seats representing the districts in the territory through elections, power remains lodged and dispersed among the different elite political clans across ethno-lingguistic groups, the rebel and other armed groups and goons, and the instrumentalities of the state acting within or even outside their institutional frameworks. Power (to destroy, capture and utilize for

32

vested interests) is exercised both within the formal domains of the administrative, bureaucratic and legislative bodies of the state, but also at the informal, seamless private spheres lodged in societal networks.

Moreover, the ARMM is a weakling compared to the other regions in Mindanao. Thus when Mindanao issues are put on the table at the executive and legislative chambers, Muslimdominated ARMM usually have to contend with a larger, more influential bloc of nonMuslim political elites coming from the other regions of Mindanao who may not have high regard for their Muslim counterparts.



Pro-war interests. Other political and economic groups and forces who benefit from war conditions effectively sabotage peace initiatives by continuing to use, create or advocate violence. As discussed in the section on “Complicating Factors”, these are state and nonstate groups (and those operating in between these two spheres or have dual capacities) whose economic and political activities flourish under war conditions. While this factor will no longer be elaborated in this section, it does not in any way mean that this is less significant than the other factors. In fact, these illegal activities are the most difficult to arrest because they are backed up by arsenals of wealth and violence, provide employment and other social benefits to a wide number of otherwise jobless people and thus have their own patronage networks, and enjoy protection from elements of the state.



Lack of national consensus. No national consensus has been reached on the need to solve the conflict in Mindanao through political negotiations that would effectively redistribute/realign political power, resources and opportunities. As already noted, the national political leadership – with the exception of the Ramos administration -- has not served as the main instrument for forging this national consensus given its own flaccid position on the matter. Christianized communities, and political and economic elites in Mindanao tend to view concessions given to Muslims as threatening to their interests and security. Thus, many support the strong-arm approach to quell Moro insurgency. Christian vigilante groups have time and again surfaced to fight perceived Muslim aggression in their midst. While the MNLF and MILF leaderships have more or less deferred to each other’s preferred tactics for the moment, there are serious cleavages and respective organizational

33

interests that can make a one-size-fits-all political package unable to address both fronts.

Given that the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army also operates in Mindanao including central cities with mixed populations like Zamboanga and Cotabato, any consensus arrived at between the state and the Moro insurgents and local politicians may still find opposition from this other armed force with its own agenda, time table, and program.

There are also fears that political and economic realignments addressed specifically to meet Moro demands might further marginalize already marginalized groups such as the lumad and the poor across the different ethno-religious groups. These concerns are highlighted by groups who have adopted the “tri-people” (Chrsitians,Muslims, and lumad) approach in viewing the “Mindanao problem”. This approach seeks to balance competing interests across the tri-peoples, but basically adopts a preferential bias for the lumad, who are the weakest among the three and have been subjected to forced recruitment by the different state and non-state armed groups. The task has been difficult, especially in defending ancestral domain claims, the most important issue among indigenous peoples . Ancestral domain claims, if fully recognized, will seriously impinge on Christian and Muslim elite landed interests. There have also been differences on how to go about the promotion of these claims. Civil society groups using the “tri-people” approach pursue their advocacy within the legal framework provided by the Indigenous People’s Rights Act. The MILF, on the other hand, sees its political struggle under its leadership as the main venue for achieving the same goals. There are understandably doubts how well a Moro organization can promote and defend non-Moro, lumad interests.

Civil society organizations networked under various peace formations have been struggling hard to generate this needed national consensus for a peaceful, negotiated and just settlement of the armed conflicts. The Christian churches have also been fairly consistent in this stance, and have openly criticized Estrada and Arroyo for their war policy. Inter-religious dialogues and community-based initiatives which have grown in number and scope over the last 10 years continue to keep afloat the possibility of attaining peace by the way of peace.

34



Complications under the current global order . International factors/contexts such as the USled global war on terrorism, the rise of international networks of groups advocating use of extreme force, can create conditions that lead to only more violence and destructive policies. As discussed, such war rhetoric largely directed against Islamic groups/states (the exception being North Korea) by the United States is only creating conditions for more extreme retaliatory actions. The Islamic communities in Mindanao are vulnerable, the ummah being conceived of as universal Muslim brotherhood, and given that international Muslim extremist networks have already penetrated the country as reflected in the 1995 arrest in Metro Manila of suspects involved in the reported plan to assassinate the pope.

The Abu Sayyaf, in its original form, is already one such manifestation of preference for even more radical action than that provided by guerilla warfare, the basic strategy adopted by the MNLF and the MILF. By and large, the current armed conflict in Mindanao, despite its international dimensions, is still a conflict that can be addressed at the national/domestic level. International mediation, which has been tapped since the late 1970s, can support such effort, certainly. In fact, in contrast to other progressive groups in the country that distrust US interference, the MILF has welcomed US involvement in the negotiation, believing that the US can prevail on the national government. The US, for its part, has chosen material incentives to inveigle rebel groups to lay down their arms and enter the fold of law.

In the final analysis, the peaceful settlement of the conflict in Mindanao cannot be

detached from or is integral to the national democratization process which includes social restructuring, cleaning up of the military and police, combating corruption, poverty alleviation, healing and reconstruction of war-weary communities, and the transformation of the Philippine state to make it more autonomous from private interests, efficient, inclusive and developmental. Democratization of the whole system also allows for greater parameters to liberalize and introduce corrective mechanisms in the political, economic and socio-cultural spheres applicable both to the national and local polities. Failure of the democratization process to move forward substantially can only mean a prolonged life span to the violent armed conflicts that have been searing the fabric of “Philippine� society. Given the current state of fractious elites, divided civil society, and festering armed groups, sadly, this may very well be the case.

35

36

1Patricio N. Abinales, Making Mindanao, Cotabato and Davao in the Formation of the Philippine Nation-State (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2000). See also Thomas M. McKenna, Muslim Rulers and Rebels, Everyday Politics and Armed Separatism in the Philippines (Manila: Anvil Publishing, Inc., 1998).

2 W.K. Che Man, Muslim Separatism, The Moros of Southern Philippines and the Malays of Southern Thailand (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1990), pp. 192-193.

3 The LAKAS-NUCD-UMDP is the coalition of parties that supported President Ramos’s presidency. LAKAS stands for Lakas ng Tao (“People Power Party); NUCD, for National Union of Christian Democrats; and UMDP for United Muslim Democrats Party.

4 Other members of the Council of 15 are Sulu Governor Yusuf Jikiri, Marawi City Mayor Solitario Omar, Cotabato city mayor Muslimin Sema, and spokesperson Alfatah Abubakar.

5Philippine Daily Inquirer, 23 Jan 2003, p. A3; “Four factions of the MILF reunite,” Philippine Star, 23 Jan 2003, p. 16.

Others considered to the post of acting chair were Alvarez Isnaji, Sulu Gov. Yusof Jikiri, and Cotabato City mayor Muslimin Sema.

6 Che Man, p.127.

7 Gutierrez and Gulial, 1997 cited in the World Bank, Environment and Social Development Unit, East Asia and Pacific Region, Social Assessment of Conflict-Affected Areas in Mindanao, Philippine Post-Conflict Series #1 (2003), p.21.

8See Maria A. Ressa, Seeds of Terror, An Eyewitness Account of Al-Qaeda’s Newest Center of Operations in Southeast Asia (New York: Free Press, 2003). Ressa put together various intelligence reports from the region and the elsewhere to establish linkages but these were not substantiated by other sources. Gaps in the series of events she outlined were bridged speculatively. On the whole, the evidence she presented against the MILF was sparse relative to groups like the Abu Sayyaf and the Jemaah Islamiyah.

9 See Luz Rimban, “A Tale of Two Cousins,” I, The Investigative Reporting Magazine, January-March 2003.

10 Cited in the World Bank report, ibid. p.10.

11 For the most recent reconstruction of events based on interviews with survivors and involved military personnel, see Marites Vitug and Glenda Gloria, Under the Crescent Moon: Rebellion in Mindanao (Quezon City: Ateneo Center for Social Policy and the Institute for Popular Democracy, 2000). For a survey of past accounts, see William LaRousse, Walking Together Seeking Peace, the Local Church of Mindana-Sulu, Journeying in Dialogue with the Muslim Community (19652000) (Quezon City: Claretian Publications, Inc., 2001), pp. 101-107.

12 See McKenna (ibid.) and Abinales (ibid.) for sample profiles and careers of traditional Cotabato elite politicians like Salipada Pendatun.

13 CheMan, pp.127-128.

14 Ibid.

15 Julkipli M. Wadi, “Strategic Intelligence Analysis of Philippine National Security, Muslim Secessionism and Fundamentalism,” paper presented at the Strategy and Conflict Studies of the Command and General Staff College Training and Doctrine Command, Philippine Army, Makati City, 14 June 2000. He described sophistication in terms of mass support; ability to inflict danger and casualty; gaining leverage with respect to the Moro struggle’s legitimacy and even legality; ability to procure, ship and use sophisticated armaments from both foreign and military sources; employment of state-of-the-art warfare; and harnessing national, regional and international linkages.

16 Recently, hostage-taking and beheadings of ordinary, Christian folk perpetuated by the Abu Sayyaf have caused wariness between Musim and Christian neighbors and have cast religious undertones over other local conflicts (for example, over sharing of spoils over illegal logging among small-time loggers), deepening divisions brought about by the bigger, historical war (see World Bank report, pp.18-19).

17 Salah Jubair, Bangsa Moro, A Nation Under Endless Tyranny (Kuala Lmpur: IQ Marin SDN BHD, 1999 (3 rd edition), pp. 1925. On the role of the sultanates, Jubair states: “The institution of the sultanate has profound relevance to, and is in fact separable from, the formation of Moro nationalism and the survival of the Moro people through the centuries” (p.26). The coverage of the homeland, he also argues, is also documented in many treaties, including the 1898 Treaty of Paris where Mindanao and Sulu were considered “foreign territory.”

18 Wadi, for example, observed: “As the (Islamic) dissent spread beyond the Middle East and Asia, this inevitably trickles (sic) down through ‘linkage politics’ to other countries and minorities like the Moros of the Philippine and shaped the domestic confluence of the Moro rebellion. Thus the supposedly local characteristic of the Moro rebellion was reconfigured and inevitably crystallized new ideological dimension, new vision, new strategy and method (sic). ... (T)he Moro rebellion must be viewed as part of a challenge against the current world order ...” (Ibid.)

19 Soliman M. Santos, Jr., The Moro Islamic Challenge, Constitutional Rethinking for the Mindanao Peace Process (Quezon City: University of the Philippines Press, 2001), pp. 39-41.

20 W.K. Che Man, Muslim Separatism, the Moros of Southern Philippines and the Malays of Southern Thailand (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1990), p. 195.

21 McKenna, ibid., pp.213-216, 282. He argued that Islamic renewal in the 1980s was led by local ustadzes who were relatively free from datu influence or military harassment and, unlike the reform-minded, Middle East-clerics who returned to the country in the 1960s, were not immediately engulfed in the armed conflict since fighting had subsided by the 1980s. (p.206) 22 Eric Gutierrez, “The Reimagination of the Bangsamoro, 30 years hence” in Kristina Gaerlan and Mara Stankovitch (eds.), Rebels, Warlords and Ulama, A Reader on Muslim Separatism and the War in Southern Philippines (Quezon City: Institute for Popular Democracy, 1999), pp.321-323.

23This re-elaboration was, among other occasions, provided by Datu Micahel Mastura who currently sits in the MILF negotiating panel, at a small meeting at the Third World Studies Center, University of the Philippines with civil society peace advocates in 2002.

24 Declaration of the Second Bangsamoro People’s Consultative Assembly held in Simuay, Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao, Mindanao, 1-3 June 2001 (Cotabato City: Bangsamoro People’s Consultative Assembly, 2001).

25 Rufa Cagoco Guiam, “Negotiations and detours: the rocky road to peace in Mindanao,” The Mindanao Peace Process, A Supplement to Compromising on Autonomy, Conciliation Resources Accord, an international review of peace initiatives, Update Issue 6 (2003), pp. 5-6.

26 Julkipli Wadi, ibid.

27 Based on several interviews with police and ARMM officers in Mindanao conducted by this author in 1999 for the study “Integration of MNLF Forces and AFP: Integration without Demobilization and Disarmament” (funded by the University of the Philippines Center for Integrative and Development Studies (see Volume 2).

28See Miriam Coronel Ferrer (ed.), The Southern Philippines Council for Peace and Development, A Response to the Controversy (Quezon City: University of the Philippines, 1999).

29 For example, Marcos insisted on a plebiscite to determine the area of coverage and instituted two instead of one autonomous governments.

30NTRC Tax Research Journal (May-June 2001) cited in Zipagan in Jose V. Abueva et al (eds.), Towards a Federal Republic of the Philippines wit a Parliamentary Government: A Reader, (Metro Manila: Center for Social Policy and Governance of Kalayaan College, Local Government Development Foundation, 2002), p.266.

31Zipagan, ibid., p.279.

32 Che Man found traditional elites the majority among elected and appointed Muslim officials in the Autonomous Government in Western Mindanao at the region, provincial and municipal levels, data affirming that traditional elites remained the most influential group in Moro society (Ibid., pp.119-121, 124).

33 World Bank report, p. 30.

34 Ibid, p. 25.

35 See Abinales, ibid.