MEMORANDUM
To: HIS EXCELLENCY BAN
KI-MOON, Secretary General, United Nations (UN)
From: Muslim and Animist Lumad Natives as well
as conscious Christians of Mindanao
AN APPEAL TO THE CONSCIENCE AND HUMANITY OF THE UNITED
NATIONS (UN), HELP RESTORE FREEDOM AND DIGNITY OF THE BANGSAMORO PEOPLE OF FILIPINO-COLONIZED MINDANAO !
The
injustice committed by the Philippine government against the colonized Muslim
and Animist Lumad natives of Mindanao for
decades now has to bother surely the conscience and humanity of the community
of nations under the reform-and-peace-conscious United Nations (UN).
“When
you don’t stand up against injustice, you participate in it,” said Ben Keller.
Does this truism speak of the indifference and insensitivity of the United
Nations to help solve the nagging Filipino-Moro war in Mindanao
imposed by Philippine colonialism?
On
one hand, is it possible for the United Nations to see the light to be guided
by the words of wisdom of Bishop Desmond Tutu? “If you are neutral in
situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”
In
history, the gruesome injustice committed by the oppressive America-sponsored
Philippine Commonwealth government under the anti-Muslim and anti-Lumad
President Manuel L. Quezon in 1935 against the Bangsamoro people of Mindanao
was the enactment by the all-Christian National Assembly of Legislative Act No.
4197 of February 2, 1936. The draconian law was otherwise known as the
“Quirino-Recto colonization Act”.
Clearly,
the sinisterly designed law legalized the naked land-grabbing of the ancestral
domain of the Muslim and Animist Lumad natives of Mindanao .
Thus, today, continuing the freedom struggle against the Spanish, American and
Japanese colonizers in the past, the Bangsamoro people are morally, actively
and militantly asserting their fundamental human rights in regaining their
freedom, independence and national self-determination from Philippine colonial
hegemony.
It
is recalled that corollary to the immoral and unlawful colonization of the
Bangsamoro homeland of Mindanao, Sulu and Palawan (MINSUPALA) in 1936, the
Philippine Quezon Commonwealth Government cunningly formalized the
land-grabbing also of the Cordillera Region (‘Mountain
Province ’) of the native Igorots of ‘Central Luzon .’ This was characterized by the immoral
annexation or incorporation of the ancestral homeland of both the Bangsamoro
and Igorot peoples of Southeast Asia into
America-designed Philippine Republic in July 4, 1946.
The
tragic reality of this colonial transaction was many years later bewailed in
1987 by Joseph F. Fallon, who emphasized: “After so many decades of abuses and
betrayal, for the Moros and Igorots to trust Manila
and to remain with the Philippines
Thus,
toward this oppressive colonial protocol of the travesty of justice conducted
even without any elementary courtesy of democratic process – referendum or
plebiscite – the oppressed and colonized Mindanaoan and Igorot natives have
always expressed indignation and protest against the blatant colonial stratagem
of the Manila government from the beginning up to this day.
The
negative assessment of Philippine colonialism enforced on Mindanao was aptly
summarized by the leader of Mindanao Independence Movement (MIM), Chairman
Reuben R. Canoy, who in 1975 stressed: “With the inauguration of the
Commonwealth in 1935 and the attainment of full independence in 1946, it was
assumed that the Mindanao policies instituted by past colonial regimes would be
scrapped…To the dismay of the Mindanaoans, the Manila government turned out to
be a worse colonizer.”
It
was also observed that after using the majesty of “rule of law” in formalizing
the criminal occupation of Moro Nation (Bangsamoro) during the Philippine
Commonwealth period, the unscrupulous Filipino politicians under President
Manuel L. Quezon embarked in dismantling the political, judicial, moral and cultural
apparatuses of the Mindanao Sultanate sovereignty, particularly the Sultanate
of Sulu and North Borneo, Sultanate of Maguindanao and Buayan of Cotabato and
the Apat na Pangampong Sultanate District of Lanao region. The malevolent
colonial scheme was perpetrated in depriving the centuries-long Muslim and
Highlander rulers of their sovereign power and influence over the native
inhabitants of Mindanao .
Furthermore,
showing disrespect for the historical and cultural heritage of the Muslim and
Lumad natives, the arrogant Filipino colonialist land-grabbers of Luzon proudly proclaimed the total eradication of Sultan
and Datu system. The political maneuver was to erase the cherished title of
Sultan and Datu among the native rulers in order to reduce them and the native
masses into perpetual colonial servants. And to bear the cursed slavish
identity “Filipino” for life when the Muslim and Lumad natives of Mindanao
never did become servants of King Philip II or colonial slaves of Spain unlike
Catholic Filipinos and Christianized-Indios. Nonetheless, the political
strategy never did succeed because the oppressed and colonized Bangsamoro
people have a very strong attachment to the Mindanao Sultanate rulership. They
have always recognized and continued to do so the moral influence of the active
leading heirs of the Mindanao Sultanate of yore up to the present period.
On
the catastrophic situation faced by the restless native inhabitants of Mindanao on the hands of the Filipino colonizers, the
Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) under Chairman Prof. Nur Misuari launched
in late 1968 the freedom struggle of the Bangsamoro people. The liberation
struggle is a continuing process up to date. The MNLF has had served actively
as the vanguard of the Muslim and Lumad natives as well as the conscious
Christians of Mindanao to regain freedom, liberty and independence.
The
sacred moral task is but only consonant with the United Nations’ Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, particularly on the following legal basis:
“(1)
The subjugation of people’s to alien subjugation, domination and exploitation
constitutes a denial of fundamental rights”, is contrary to the Charter of the
UN and “an impediment to the preservation of world peace,” and,
“(2)
All peoples have the right to self-determination, by virtue of that right they
feely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic status,
social and cultural development.”
On
this particular point of reference, the Moro National Liberation Front, which
is recognized by the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) as
“Permanent Observer” and representative of the Bangsamoro people of Mindanao,
had forwarded a petition to the UN for the complete freedom and independence of
Mindanao, Sulu and Palawan . The diplomatic
appeal was submitted to the UN Decolonization Committee in New York Mindanao peace was betrayed for the third time by the
Philippine government by totally ignoring the comprehensive and correct
implementation of the 1976 Tripoli Peace Agreement, 1987 Jeddah Peace Accord
and the final 1996 Jakarta Peace Agreements.
On
the part of the Bangsamoro women, professionals, youth and mass supporters of
the freedom struggle to regain human dignity and emancipation from colonial
slavery, Madam Mucha-Shim Quiling-Arquiza, a representative of the Lumad and
Muslim natives of Mindanao to the United Nations Human Right Council Forum on
Minority Issues (4th Session) in Geneva on November 29-30, 2011, submitted a
clear strong appeal for immediate consideration by the UN August Assembly. She
expressed the following soul-searching words:
“My
last plea is a concrete call to action. I am addressing the Government of Spain
and the United States of
America
On
this particular note, since Philippine colonialism today under President
Benigno S. Aquino III has again showed no interest to implement the letter and
spirit of the September 2, 1996 MNLF-OIC-GRP Jakarta Peace Agreements, the
Bangsamoro people as represented by the MNLF in the OIC have decided in
reverting to the original objective of complete independence and national
self-determination.
In
the last week of August, 2013, the MNLF political, military and religious leaders,
including the Bangsamoro mass supporters, had decided in framing a
revolutionary government Constitution towards the formal establishment of the
United Federated States of Bangsamoro Republik (UFSBR). On August 25, 2013, the
announcement and reading of the Preamble of the Bangsamoro Constitution and the
proclamation of the United Federated States of Bangsamoro Republik was
simultaneously conducted in Zamboanga City and in all MNLF camps throughout Mindanao .
Consequently,
the landmark official and formal declaration of Bangsamoro independence and
self-determination from the Philippine Republic was conducted in the General
Headquarters (GHQ) of the Lupah Sug State Revolutionary Committee (LSRC) in Jolo Island Zamboanga City
In
the presence of the different MNLF state leaders and Bangsamoro freedom
fighters as well as mass supporters from all walks of life, Chairman Nur
Misuari declared the “freedom, sovereignty and independence as well as the
inseparable unity of the entire Bangsamoro homeland Sulu Archipelago composed
originally of Basilan, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi, Palawan and Zamboanga Peninsula,
including the entire region of North Borneo (‘Sabah’ and ‘Sarawak’ now) as a free
sovereign and independent nation state.”
On
the historic occasion, the MNLF Chairman issued the appeal: “We hereby call
upon the people of the world, most particularly the United Nations and the UN
Secretary General, His Excellency Ban Ki-Moon, to extend their formal
recognition and support behind this new State.”
Hence,
the Muslim and Animist Lumad natives as well as the conscious Christians of
Mindanao rest their case now before the community of nations and global
humanity whose primordial interest is for world peace and the rectification or
eradication of social injustices committed in the past. If the vestiges of grim
injustice still linger today it is due to few political leaders who are still
without compassion towards the suffering and misery of their fellowmen.
Finally,
certainly serving a guiding light to the just and lasting solution to the
Filipino-Moro war in Mindanao is the thought
of one revolutionary global thinker, Franz Fannon, who said: “Man is a yes…yes
to life. Yes to love. Yes to generosity. But man is also a no. No to scorn of
man. No to degradation of man. No to exploitation of man. No to the butchery of
what is most human in man: FREEDOM.” –osm, mnlfnet.com
http://mnlfnet.com/Articles/Editorial_09Aug2014_An%20Appeal%20to%20the%20Conscience%20&%20Humanity%20of%20the%20UN.htm
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