The Moro battle against colonialism

The Mamasapano incident once again brought into the headlines the Philippine dilemma in Moro Mindanao, the cycle of uneasy peace and sporadic bloodshed that goes back a long way.

Many reasons have been proffered by political analysts, media elites, and their ilk; but the reasons given miss the all too obvious and persistent reality - that the Moro peoples of Mindanao are victims of Colonialism, one perpetuated and perpetrated by the Republic of the Philippines.

Let us review Philippine history.

When Spain began to colonize from Cebu what would ultimately become the Philippines in 1565, the Moro states in Mindanao (including the Islands of Basilan, Sulu, and Tawi-Tawi) were already organized into central governments that enjoyed a civilization with important Malay and Arab ties: Important because, as the imminent historian and debunker of Philippine myths, William Henry Scott had shown us, the Moro took active part in the vital trade of Chinese goods.

The Sulu Sultanate, the portal of Islamization of a portion of Mindanao, was established in 1450, about 122 years before the establishment of Manila as the capital of the Philippines under Spain.

The Sultanate of Maguindanao would be established as early as 1516 (http://www.ncca.gov.ph/about-culture-and-arts/articles-on-c-n-a/article.php?i=232&igm=4). And well within the 16th Century, when Spanish Rule was still quite new, the Royal Sultanate of Lanao was founded.

The above recitation only belabors the point of repeated taking and retaking of these Moro states - and of the smaller others like them - that persisted into the 20th Century when the Americans would finish what the Spaniards did not quite accomplish.

But the American conquest of what it called "the Moro Provinces" did not end with a full stop.

As we Filipinos (from "Felipenos" or taxpayers to Felipe, King of Spain, claims the Hispanist, Gullermo Gomez Rivera, to this author) know only too well, the Moro conflict continues.  And in whatever form it now takes - whether warlordism, tribalism, uprisings or revolts, guerilla warfare, passive resistance - has its deep and tragic roots in the Spanish and American colonization of the Moro states, states that the Philippines has inherited and kept colonized.

The Moro states in modern day Mindanao are not singular, cookie-cutter units as their history, ethnicity, language, arts and culture show; thus they should not be treated as a homogenous lump. That these states are followers of Islam is helpful information but not the full picture.

What this tells us Christian Filipinos is that whatever Constitution is crafted by our most brilliant minds will never work for them, that there will be no such thing as "unconstitutional" when applied to any Moro liberation effort because the Moro never considered himself a taxpayer of Spain or a "happy colonial" under the Americans.

The Moro may have played along being "Filipinos" like the rest of the Christian populace after World War II but this may arguably be a matter of expedience than conviction.

In the present colonial set-up, the Moro states under Philippine rule can follow their Mohameddan faith but not their royal tradition. Manila Bulletin wrote, "The traditional respect for sultans and datus continues among Moros from Basilan to Tawi-Tawi many years after the Philippine Constitution stopped to officially recognize them as royalty."

The Moro Shariah courts may be recognized by Philippine Law, but honestly, can two laws really operate in co-existence under one state (the Republic of the Philippines) without one subverting the other?

Any war - all-out included - by the Philippines would never totally subjugate the Moro states into total submission. Just as it took the Philippines over 300 years through pocket periods of peace and progress to finally throw off Spanish yoke, the Moro states has the luxury of time; According to the scholar Hannbal Bara it will only be 100 years this August 2015 when the Sultanate of Sulu surrendered its sovereignty to the United States colonial government in the Philippine Islands.

In the face of this colonial reality, any effort at self-determinism by the Moro states under Philippine rule will never work.

What the Philippines can do at this point after Mamasapano is to begin to redefine terms and call the problem for what it really is. And then let the Christian Filipinos that run this country remember that the Philippines too was once a colony, that an enslaved nations want to be free.

(Editor: Bagares is a freelance journalist who has written for Cebu-based and national publications. He specializes in public history and heritage features.)