The derailing of the work
of peace makers is raising the odds of renewed conflict in Mindanao.
The
plight of the southern Philippines is a lesson in how not to undertake a
peace process. It especially illuminates the pitfalls of negotiating without
the wholehearted commitment of the stakeholders, especially the central
government. Successive regimes in Manila have made feints at achieving a settlement in
Mindanao, but the national leadership has been in turns
half-hearted, dilatory and insincere. So the south remains in turmoil despite
the best intentions and unflagging efforts of peace advocates. Whatever else,
the so-called Mindanao problem has much to teach the international community
about intractable warfare. Hard-won lessons in this southernmost and second
largest island of the Philippines can undoubtedly contribute to understanding
civil unrest and the challenges of peace-building in general.
Often
dismissed as a religious war, the conflict in Mindanao is far too complicated
for simplistic labels. Centuries ago, when Spanish (and then American) invaders
established control across the archipelago, the southern region was already
part of a tide of Malay Islam which resisted Manila-based incursions
vigorously. But mainly the Moros – the indigenous Muslims – thrived in an
atmosphere of benign neglect. After independence, however, the central power
became more assertive and Mindanao fell subject to a form of internal
imperialism. The centrifugal impulse towards separatism grew ever stronger
among increasingly alienated clans and tribes. It remains difficult for a
largely Islamic and fiercely independent bangsamoro homeland to identify
with a Catholicized, neo-colonial Philippine nationalism. Economic exploitation
and rapacious development have compounded feelings of exclusion and
powerlessness among Moros, lumads (indigenous peoples), and the landless
poor.
This
Mindanao imbroglio permits the enemies of peace to manipulate complex issues
for their own purposes. In such cases, academe, the media, and other opinion
makers have a special responsibility to speak truth to power and provide some
much-needed analysis. This sort of rigor has been absent in Philippine public
life, allowing the worst rogues to reinvent themselves at will and even to
interfere with peace initiatives ostensibly to protect the constitution and the
sovereignty of the state, thus revealing the difficulties of a weak polity in
achieving a political settlement with a disgruntled, rebellious, and distant
territory.
During
decades of vicious fighting between the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP)
and a series of secessionist groups, Mindanao has occasionally appeared to be
poised on the brink of peace as various political settlements moved towards
fruition. The fate of these initiatives explains the nature of the turmoil in
the south. Peace efforts since the 1976 Tripoli Agreement reveal a process
which insiders appear unable to put into perspective and outsiders simply do
not comprehend.
The Moro
National Liberation Front (MNLF) under its charismatic leader Nur Misuari led
the modern struggle for Muslim independence until surrendering to the administration
of Fidel Ramos in 1996 (the so-called Davao Consensus). Such arrangements
invariably work in favor of the central government, itself too corrupt and
cash-strapped to honor its commitments. Development funds go astray and in the
1996 case Ramos even appears to have introduced the dreaded Abu Sayyaf Group
(ASG) into the volatile equation as a means of compromising the Moro cause and
linking it to Islamic extremism. And by 2001, Washington had branded Mindanao
the Second Front in the new War on Terror. The southern Philippines was dragged
into a global predicament and its problems became ever more complicated.
Bangsamoro Basic Law
Most
recently, a Memorandum of Agreement – Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD) between the
government of the Philippines (GPH) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front
(MILF) achieved widespread acceptance, only to be knocked down by the Supreme
Court in 2008 as unconstitutional. This in turn led to renewed fighting and the
formation of the ruthless Bangsamoro Freedom Fighters (BFF). The latest
incarnation of the peace process is the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), an
initiative which comes after further drawn out negotiations between the GPH and
the MILF. It is intended to put in place a Bangsamoro Autonomous Region (BAR),
thereby replacing the existing Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM),
which has not lived up to expectations or quieted secessionist rumblings in the
south. But the BBL has serious problems.
The
impetus for talks emerged largely from a realization by the warring parties
that nothing more could be achieved from the fighting other than the peace of
the graveyard. But such a shared perception is not in or of itself a sound
basis for a settlement of fundamental differences. Something more than
exhaustion is required, especially if flare-ups and misunderstandings are to be
avoided. On January 25, 2015, a contingent of the Philippine
National Police (PNP) was ambushed near the township of Mamasapano
and 44 commandos were killed along with a number of Moro fighters and
civilians.
In the
aftermath of this Mamasapano Massacre and with the BBL looking moribund, the
Aquino administration convened a group of luminaries to examine the troubled
proposal and create a popular consensus around it. Both the government and the
various dignitaries who accepted the invitation to serve on this Peace Council
showed extraordinary hubris, but a National Peace Summit was duly held in April
to seek views and recommendations. The Peace Council ultimately declared:
“While imperfect, [the BBL] is a significant document that should serve as
catalyst for building national consensus.” Less clear was the impact of these
“responsible and respected leaders” on the general public.
Above
all, efforts were being made to endorse the package while conceding that there
was need for repairs. A new form of government for the Islamic communities of
Mindanao was being appraised on behalf of an extremely suspicious national
polity. Various features of the BBL, it was decided, should be defined or
refined – or declined. Much of the 196-page report is loquacious, dense, and
legalistically abstruse, but its particular failing was that it could not
convince a skeptical populace about the value of the BBL. Time is running out
for this peace settlement.
Lessons
Meanwhile,
the burdens of the conflict allow some useful comparisons with civil unrest
elsewhere, including Africa and places like Sri Lanka and Burma. There are many
lessons to be learned, some of which are very depressing. How a deeply riven
polity can overcome entrenched socio-cultural divisions is a case in point. Mindanao’s
painful journey into (or away from) the Philippine nation provides some
pointers. That nothing can be done without honest brokers would seem to be
especially instructive. On the other hand, the scrutiny of players by reputable
and reliable non-players has succeeded only at a superficial level. And the
modern habit of describing everyone as stakeholders is especially deceptive,
undermining as it does the fact that some people have infinitely more at stake
than others. And a few so-called spoilers (foremost among which are splinter
groups on both sides) wield far too much power.
Many
critics assert, for example, that the part of the armed forces in Mindanao has
been consistently disruptive and bellicose. Officers actively seek appointments
there, balancing personal risk against valor awards and rapid promotion. Apart
from the moral issue of receiving medals for killing one’s countrymen (and
women and children), the military elite serves too many functions and asserts
too much power in the present situation. With its impunity and immunity, the
AFP in Mindanao has become a parallel government, imposing its will on a
countryside enduring quasi-martial law. This situation provides an opportunity
to evaluate the role of armed forces in civil unrest, which is essential to
understanding the militarization of peace. All that appears to have been
offered to the bangsamoro people is a means to comply with the ambitions
of Imperial Manila and “return to the fold of the law.”
Potential
gains from a successful agreement are high, but not as high as anticipated by
those who tend to link such an achievement with improved governance, public
services, development, and tourism. Such returns are possible, but the outcomes
of a peace deal and the establishment of a new autonomous region in the south
simply cannot – and should not? – be quantified in such a way. In particular,
too many stakeholders emphasize a form of developmentalism and economic
transition which threaten indigenous interests and would drive many Moros back to
armed resistance. Indeed, a major stumbling block for peace in Mindanao is a
fundamental lack of agreement about what that actually means!
The
current autonomy proposal is itself a compromised compromise. It was not the
end point for Muslim separatists and any thwarting of modified Moro aspirations
will put independence back on the agenda, along with renewed fighting and a
deepening of the insurgent struggle. At present the impulse to independence is
contained within breakaway groups like the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters
(BIFF), which lack either clear goals or capable leaders. They comprise mainly
old men, but their message has begun to resonate within youth assemblies. With
the BBL’s downward trajectory, Manila’s machinations, and the general anti-Moro
sentiments of so many Filipinos will likely condemn any and all moves towards a
workable new autonomy agreement and leave Mindanao wracked by another
generation of unrest.
“The
implementation of all peace agreements and legislation of any Basic Law must be
inclusive,” the influential Cotabato-based Institute for Autonomy and
Governance (IAG) concluded in a recent study. “An autonomy
arrangement ‘franchised’ by a group or individual is bound to fail. Processes
and structures moving forward must involve and be supported by all key
stakeholders including minority groups”. In its upbeat and positivist report,
the IAG emphasized four main considerations. First, it argues that agreements
between the Philippine government and successive Moro fronts have been “good
roadmaps for the evolving development of meaningful autonomy.” But such a claim
needs to be based upon some successful outcome; the IAG has chosen to ignore
the fact that Mindanao may be further away from a settlement than ever.
Second,
the IAG warns that full adoption of the BBL (or any other peace agreement) is
not possible in current circumstances. Yet the BBL is an organic document and
it is difficult to imagine what a partial implementation might look like. It
would certainly have little support.
Third,
the BBL remains mired in a legacy “of weaknesses in the national bureaucracy …
and the timidity and lack of capacity of the autonomous government.” So the IAG
insists that capacities must be increased and reforms achieved, but this sort
of challenge should surely have been resolved earlier in the negotiations.
Fourth, the BBL must be inclusive and take into account previous agreements.
Pre-existing promises made to the MNLF should be recognized. But such
high-minded fiats fail to acknowledge that there has been a centrifugal force
at work all along, a path in negotiations marked by defections, factionalism,
and disagreements. Many parties do not want to participate and reject
inclusivity as a form of compulsion. By the IAG’s own admission, the BBL is in
a state of “suspended animation.” Ideas about moving forward assume that the
direction is clear and accepted by all, yet at the moment the players in the
Mindanao drama seem to lack even a reliable compass.
In the
mass of self-serving criticism, the constitutional shortcomings of the BBL have
become paramount. A similar device was previously used to destroy the MOA-AD.
An obsessive emphasis on legalities simply provides a place for spoilers of
whatever ilk to hide, bide their time, then ultimately derail the agreement.
The persistent damage caused by an immense lack of goodwill, an extraordinary
amount of fear and suspicion, failure of leadership, and eye-watering
corruption and duplicity on the part of official agencies and various other
parties goes largely unrecognized.
Many
observers point to the BBL as being aspirational in nature, but this rather
misses the point. To argue, as the IAG does, that it is a “roadmap document”
ignores the depth of ill-will waiting on this particular highway to hell. Build
on incremental gains, the IAG concludes; a phalanx of weary peace advocates
thought they were essentially doing that in order to progress beyond the
debacle of the MOA-AD and all that had gone before.
Death Knell
The
congressional process will probably be the death knell for the BBL. While the
chair of a 75-member ad hoc committee boasted about arranging 32 public
hearings and “the most comprehensive and inclusive consultations in the history
of the House of Representatives,” he was also pronouncing the demise of the BBL
in a fractious and debilitating gabfest. After much contrived delay, the BBL
finally went before the two houses of Congress, where it literally fell among
thieves (sadly, this is no metaphor; an embarrassing number of legislators have
been caught up in the so-called Pork Barrel scandal, including Senator
Ferdinand [BongBong] Marcos, Jr, the son of the dictator, who has done much to
damage the BBL. If it should even survive parliamentary review, the Supreme
Court has indicated serious constitutional concerns. And a plebiscite must
follow these interminable considerations. The BBL is being talked to death!
While the
rest of the country deals with the shameful news that BongBong Marcos is
running for vice-president in next year’s elections, the senator traduces those
who fought and died to rid the Philippines of his father’s dictatorship – even
as he destroys any chance for peace in the south by imposing impossible
constraints on the BBL. Now a clutch of Mindanao groups under the leadership of
Orlando Quevedo, Cardinal Archbishop of Cotabato, is fighting back with a
public appeal for a workable peace. They seek acceptance of the original BBL,
pointing out that the Marcos version is unconstitutional, misleading, and
counter-productive. The stakes are high: If Quevedo and his desperate allies do
not prevail, the future is certain to be as violent as the past.
But
Marcos is not alone. Few stakeholders have treated the peace negotiations
openly and honestly; the BBL will surely now disappear under the barrage of
fearful Islamophobia, cynical partisanship, vested interest, and massive
inertia. Not enough people outside of local communities, those directly
affected by the fighting, even want a new autonomous entity in Mindanao. The
island of seems to be in the grip of an intractable conflict between successive
administrations in Manila and the insurgent forces fighting for a bangsamoro
homeland in the south. But if there is any prospect for peace at all, it lies
with unpacking the past and challenging perceptions of archipelagic history
which maintain and strengthen the ruinous status quo. The only way
forward is to recognize that the Mindanao predicament has been fashioned by
entrenched elites and powerful economic interests, which use historical
imperatives as a weapon against any consensus for peace.
A
political process cannot be carried forward without an immense amount of
goodwill and enthusiasm. Yet the BBL has been beaten into its present shape on
an anvil of distrust and dissembling. Such rough diplomacy should not be allowed
to compromise a reasonable outcome, which can only be achieved through a
formula recognizing what is achievable and what is necessary. At this stage the
BBL simply has not fired the popular imagination; the need for peace must be
more generally appreciated. When the powers-that-be seek only immediate
political gains and are not wholly committed to the overall endeavor, failure
is certain. The outgoing Aquino administration bears much of the blame for the
current impasse, but there is little reward in criticizing a do-nothing regime
for doing nothing, especially in regard to confronting the forces arrayed
against any accommodation with the Moros.
The
passage of the latest peace initiative, along with the establishment of a new
sub-state in the south, has fallen behind schedule. The Mamasapano Massacre at
the beginning of 2015 led to the suspension of the BBL amidst a veritable
tsunami of Islamophobia, finger-pointing, and accusation. Sadly, the eclipse of
Moro dreams and the derailing of endeavors by peace advocates raise the
likelihood of renewed conflict in Mindanao. The resolution of the crisis lies
in its past; solving the crisis would require an overhaul of the prevailing
perception of Philippine history and, ipso facto, a reworking of ideas
about nation and nationalism. Is the Philippine experience inclusive or
exclusive? This dilemma is not likely to be resolved any time soon. Hence
Mindanao’s current impasse; hence its misery. By Peter M. Sales
No comments:
Post a Comment