The certification for the passage of the Bangsamoro Basic Law by President Duterte as urgent is perplexing and disheartening. The President should be reminded that the government won decisively against the band of terrorists who tried to hostage the country’s biggest Muslim-dominated city, resulting in the death of 114 soldiers and now costing the government about P10 billion to reconstruct. In addition, 240 were killed, 242 injured and 118,819 of our own people, mostly Muslim, were displaced. Thus, granting autonomy at this point is something of a bitter pill for many Filipinos to swallow.
There are several reasons why this column is against the granting of autonomy, more so if the proposal would be sealed by a Constitutional guarantee. First, the cry for autonomy is based on their claim of discrimination and for the search of a cultural identity of their own. But such is not the case. Political agitators, demagogues and foreign-manipulated zealots have their own different motives. Some want to satisfy the demands of their foreign brokers who are interested in seeing this country dismembered.
After failing to win in their bloody rampage, they now take a step backward by demanding the passage of an autonomy law. Political agitators and demagogues ride on the issue, expecting they would be able to cash in on that idiotic proposal. It is their ambition that is goading them to secure the passage of a custom-tailored autonomy. They are not interested in nationalism to unite us as Filipinos. They just want to segregate themselves which in fact is a reverse form of discrimination.
Discrimination against our Muslim brothers has never been an issue in this country. Rather, discrimination has been their clever way to justify their separatist instinct to which no sane Filipino will agree. Muslims are not discriminated in their quest for education, in seeking employment or in aspiring for public office, in eating in a restaurant, in going to public places, or traveling to any part of the Philippines. In fact, the government even subsidizes their annual Haj to Mecca, and act which it does not extend to other religions.
To be sure, it is the Philippine government that has been accommodating them just to buy peace. These political demagogues and zealots are simply engaged in agitating the people knowing they could easily sway the mind of the ignorant. The grant of autonomy at this point is like telling the whole world that this country is ruled by stupid people. If one would take the area demanded by them compared to the area they managed to temporarily occupy during the siege, the net effect is that they won the war by technicality, at a price of more than a hundred of our soldiers killed.
Despite the bloody secessionist war they waged from 1974 to 1976 and sporadically onward, that led to the creation of an autonomy in Region IX composed of the provinces of Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi, and Zamboanga del Norte, Zamboanga del Sur and the cities of Dipolog, Dapitan, Pagadian and Zamboanga, and in Region XII composed of the provinces of Lanao del Norte, Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao, North Cotabato and Sultan Kudarat, while the cities of Cotabato, Iligan and Marawi that did not help stabilize the situation because they simply have their own agenda on what they want to do.
The Cory Aquino Constitution even created two autonomous regions but did not bring about the desired peace. First, the two major Muslim groups, the Tausugs, on one hand, and the Maranaos and Maguindanao, on the other hand, do not share the same cultural and historical heritage or speak the same vernacular language. Second, the Tausugs still maintain their loyalty to the Sultan of Sulo while the Maranaos prefer closer ties with Malaysia. Third, the Maranaos are more fundamentalist and openly announce their links to the international Islamic terrorists groups wanting to form an Islamic state, while the Tausugs are more secular. Fourth, there have been few instances where the two have been united historically, except for that interlude of fighting Marcos as proxy for Malaysia.
Most stupidly, the MILF is urging President Duterte to give in to their demand for a wider autonomy even after their disastrous defeat. This is fraud, not to mention that many of the proposed provisions in that unheralded BBL are contrary to the Constitution. Noticeable is the fact that the MILF has not mentioned anything to revise some of their demands if only to satisfy the constitutional requirement, notwithstanding that the Filipino people would have to ratify the constitution that will equally affect them. Otherwise, it will be self-serving and downright stupid if only the people in the area ratify the BBL.
There are two possible scenarios under this proposal: One, to give them a much wider area or stick to the same boundary given them under the existing autonomous law. Two, to offer them a smaller area consequent to their defeat. It does not matter whether it was the Maute group or the MILF that was defeated. Nonetheless, both formulas remain difficult to resolve much that these demagogues and zealots will stick to their original demand.
To be candid, even Muslims residing in Marawi are now having second thoughts in handing jurisdiction of their city to these zealots fearing that any attempt to oppose would again result in bloodshed and their city reduced to ashes. Others argue that even if the terrorists have their valid grievance, they should have chosen their battleground outside the city, to minimize if not spare it from destruction and prevent the displacement of a large number of their own people. But it seems the terrorists indirectly sought the destruction of their city and let their own people suffer.
Finally, it is not even clear whether the MILF is in fact demanding autonomy or wants the creation of a sub-state preparatory to their formal secession from the Republic. The MILF’s chief peace negotiator is not saying anything except to demand that we ratify the BBL. According to Mohagher Iqbal, once the basic law is ratified, the MILF will dissolve and become an NGO operating and having powers parallel to that of the Philippine government which cannot be done because there can be no two states within a state.
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