The long tortuous road to self-determination in Mindanao

Adhering to principles enshrined in the Bangsamoro Basic Law will lead to a lasting peace.

By Cardinal Orlando Quevedo
Cotabato:  The journey towards peace in the southern Philippines has been arduous and tedious, at times hostile and adversarial, replete with stops and punctuated by intermittent warfare and all out war.

But at other times, the journey has been collaborative, infused with mutual trust, slowly reaching the final steps — the 10 Decision Points on Principles, the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro, later the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro, and finally the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL).

Both sides— the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) — with a pervading sense of the common good of all Filipinos, passionately contested every provision in the BBL.

For more than 17 years both peace panels have persistently pursued peace.

World and local history has repeatedly shown how no one can quell a rebellion for self-determination with just guns. When victory seems to have been won, the aspiration for self-determination lives on and will once again erupt into armed conflict.

Such is the nature of the Bangsamoro aspiration for self-determination which no successive regimes — colonial, Spanish, American or Filipino — could kill.

At the center of years of peace negotiation were three major socio-political and moral principles.

They are the preservation of national sovereignty, the safeguarding of national territorial integrity, and the realization of self-determination for the Bangsamoro.

The BBL is firmly rooted in these principles.

Towards the goal of self-determination the MILF had to give up and sacrifice its original identity as a separatist movement and become a Bangsamoro voice to be part and parcel of the Republic of the Philippines.

Fundamentally, peace negotiators, with legal and constitutional partners, meticulously strove to articulate the various provisions in such a way that they were constitutional.

Also, they had to make sure that the self-determination granted was not a first step towards secession and that the autonomy of the Bangsamoro would be more than what was granted by the Organic Act that created the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).

The principles of subsidiarity and solidarity, already enshrined in the Philippine constitution, and the principle of devolution of power govern the asymmetrical relationship between the proposed regional Bangsamoro autonomous government and the national government.

Our legislators are in the enviable position to crown 17 years of peacemaking with the approval of the BBL.

To my mind, they are not only legislators. Regarding the BBL, their legislative role is eminently one of peacemaking.

They can either ignore the painstaking achievements of almost two decades of peacemaking by emasculating the BBL in such a way that the aspiration of self-determination becomes once more a hollow dream.

Or they can strengthen the BBL, refining its letter and preserving its spirit, so that the issues of constitutionality, national sovereignty, territorial integrity, devolution of power, the nature of a regional autonomous region, the rights of indigenous peoples and Christian minorities, as well as peoples of other faiths, and other issues, are resolved.

The BBL will not solve all the problems of criminality and lack of peace. It will not end all armed conflicts due to feuding clans or land disputes. And small groups will continue to fight for secession. But the BBL is the alternative for the overwhelming majority of the Bangsamoro and for our own military and security forces who are tired of war. It is the alternative to radicalization and extremism now spreading towards Southeast Asia and lapping at our shores.

The Lord of history has brought us to a crossroads on the journey to a just and lasting peace. This is akin to the scriptural crossroads. One way leads to death. The other leads to life.

To approve a BBL that is lesser than the Organic Act of the ARMM and falls short of self-determination as liberally granted by the constitution is to perpetuate social injustice and human underdevelopment.

But to approve a BBL — strengthened by legislative wisdom and preserving substantively the letter and spirit of the proposed BBL — leads to social justice, peace and human development.

Cardinal Orlando Quevedo is archbishop of Cotabato and the lead convenor of the group Friends of Peace.

Source: UCAN