DIMINISHING RETURNS FOR US IN PHILIPPINE ENGAGEMENT EXCEPT IN MINDANAO

Diminishing Returns for US in Philippine Engagement Except in Mindanao
By: Ishak Mastura (LL.M., J.D.)

While Manila's rumor mill and the general public are preoccupied by the latest intra-elite scandal on the Chinese-funded $330 million National Broadband Network project wherein one faction of the oligarchic elite identified with the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Jose De Venecia, (no less than his son and namesake Jose De Venecia Jr., a telecommunications businessman, is involved) is pitted against the partisans of Mike Arroyo, the husband of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, there is an ongoing geopolitical realignment in East Asia in which the Philippines is slowly but surely becoming a focus of geopolitical machinations similar to the part that Lebanon plays in the Middle East. The ground zero of this realignment is not the self-satisfied "imperial" center in Manila but in its southern region of Mindanao.

While the Philippines may possibly no longer be called as the "sick man of Asia" because recently it has been showing signs of a shaky economic vitality growing 7.5% in GDP in the second quarter this year (which growth is primarily attributed to the pump-priming effect of national and local election spending by the oligarchic elite candidates in May), political instability remains a fact of life in the country with fresh rumblings of the coup prone military's restiveness. This political instability makes the Philippines inward looking and this is true as well for the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), which is tied down with the decades-long insurgencies of the Communist New People's Army and the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in Mindanao, and as such, it cannot even begin to defend the country's airspace and maritime borders.

One consequence of this chronic weakness of the Philippines is that its traditional ally and former colonial master, the US, is increasingly looking to partner with Indonesia and Vietnam since it views these two countries as emerging Regional Powers. As the world's 4th and 11th most populous states, with strong economic growth, sizable armed forces and historical wariness of China, Indonesia and Vietnam are seen by the US as having the potential and inclination, as they modernize their economies and military forces with US assistance, to serve as autonomous counterweights to Chinese influence in Southeast Asia (Twining, D., "America's Grand Design in Asia", Washington Quarterly, Summer 2007). As both strategic partners and independent centers of strength, they may prove more important than traditional US allies, Thailand and the Philippines, which for economic and cultural reasons appear to be growing more comfortable with rising Chinese influence in Asia even as their neighbors become more wary (Twining, 2007). The Philippine economic elite, for example, is dominated by the so-called Taipans or ethnic Chinese oligarchic businessmen. Philippine business is identified with the ethnic Chinese, as the national and local business chambers' leadership and membership can attest. Thailand's erstwhile Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is an ethnic Chinese and their largest conglomerates are ethnic Chinese-owned.

Moreover, in the US assessment, Thailand and the Philippines do not possess the long-term power potential of Indonesia or Vietnam (Twining, 2007).

Indications are that the Philippine military assistance from the US for FY2008 will be diminished to $11 million from previous highs when Mindanao in the south was declared as the second front on the war on terror and US troops were deployed to assist the AFP in interdicting the criminal and terrorist Abu Sayyaf group in Basilan island in the Sulu archipelago in 2002. The Sulu archipelago is strategically located astride the major shipping route for the biggest oil tankers passing through their preferred route of the Lombok Strait then the Makassar Strait in Indonesia before going through the Sibutu Strait in the Sulu Sea and then either through the Mindoro Strait or through the Palawan Passage out to the South China Sea.

However, in one aspect is the US interest in the Philippines not being diminished and that is in USAID projects in Mindanao with the latest signing of the multi-year Mindanao Peace and Development Agreement worth $190 million. The Economic Support Fund (ESF) for FY 2008, which starts October 1, will increase from $25.9 million, up from the 2005-2006 levels of $24.7 million. The ESF promotes economic development and access to education in Mindanao. Under the Bush administration proposed appropriations, Development Assistance will also increase from $14.9 million last year to $22.9 million.

The reason for this is the need for US presence in Mindanao to complete a strategic encirclement of China in its periphery wherein "bringing up the rear to the forward bases in Taiwan , would neatly close the circle." (Ahmad, A. "At the mouth of a volcano", Frontline, Volume 19, Issue 14, July 6-19, 2002). No wonder that Chinese Navy strategists also appear to view the US presence in Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippine south as forming a "blockade" of China's legitimate maritime security interests (Cole, B., "Chinese Naval Modernization and Energy Security", Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University, 2006 Pacific Symposium, Washington, D.C., July 20, 2006).

US presence in Mindanao has already been achieved through the Joint Special Operations Task Force based in Zamboanga City with US contingents in other Philippine bases in the Sulu archipelago and the rest of Mindanao, particularly in the Muslim Moro-dominated areas. The US can probably live with the fact that they are not subject to attacks by the local Moro population or the Moro revolutionary fronts, the MILF and the MNLF (whose military activities are now confined to Sulu island alone) because their massive economic assistance to the Moro areas of Mindanao allows them free rein (or gives them the excuse) to go wherever they want.

More importantly for the US Pacific Command is that the US navy including their submarines have free passage and unquestioned semi-permanent presence in the vital Sulawesi-Sulu Seas corridor while being allowed to resupply from nearby US military posts inside Philippine bases in Mindanao through its Mutual Logistics and Services Agreement and Voluntary Forces Agreement with the Philippine government, achieving a veritable "offshore or hovering base presence" (ala the science fiction or comic book rendering of a hover base). However, one international NGO, Focus on the Global South, has reported in August that the Pentagon has designated its operating base in Sulu as "Advance Operating Base 920". Focus, said that in June 6, 2007, the US Naval Facilities Engineering Command awarded a $14.4-million contract to Global Contingency Services LLC of Irving, Texas for “operations support” for the JSOTF - Philippines.

Lately, the premise has also been laid that the Sulawesi-Mindanao Arc is part of the so-called "ungoverned territories". These are geographical areas in the world in which a state faces significant challenges in establishing control. The 2007 RAND study (Ungoverned Territories, Understanding and Reducing Terrorism Risks, RAND, 2007) says that "ungoverned territories can be failed or failing states, poorly controlled land or maritime borders, or areas within otherwise viable states where the central government's authority does not extend" (RAND, 2007). In the case of Mindanao, particularly the Moro rebel-controlled areas and the surrounding Moro population centers as well as the vast tracks of inhospitable terrain that the Moros occupy, the area is considered by the RAND study as an area of "contested governance" where the Moro ethnic groups refuses to acknowledge the legitimacy of the government's rule and pledges loyalty to some other form of social organization, such as an insurgent movement (i.e. MILF), tribe or clan or other identity group. In most cases, areas of contested governance such as Muslim Mindanao, the groups contesting the state's authority are seeking to establish their own state-like entity.

The utility of designating Muslim Mindanao, which includes the Sulu archipelago where US presence is most felt, as an "ungoverned territory" and as an arena of contested governance by the Moro ethnic groups is that it allows the US military to insert its presence without much protest or resistance from the central government since they are effectively not within the writ of the central government's authority. So no matter the protestations of violation of sovereignty by the central government, the very fact that there is contested governance means that the consent of the Moros are all that the Americans need to operate in the area once the formalities with the central government are ironed out in the guise of logistics access agreements. So far with the massive economic assistance of the USAID, the Moro consent to US presence in their territories has been facilitated and no American soldier has been targetted by insurgent attacks by the Moro rebel groups.

Moreover, it is in Mindanao that the two strategic vectors of the Pentagon's third Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) 2006 converge. These two vectors are: "the so-called long war against Islamic radicalism, and an increased emphasis on shaping the behavior of China by means of military "dissuasion" (Conetta, C., "Dissuading China and Fighting the 'Long War'", World Policy Journal, Summer 2006). The strategy of the "long war" allows for the policy framework for more U.S. interventions abroad as we are now witnessing in Mindanao. However, according to one critic:

"The long war as envisaged in the QDR defines an agenda and scope of action for the US military that is virtually indeterminate - insofar as its purview encompasses the entire Muslim world. Identification of the enemy tend to be categorical, rather than specific, and the criteria for inclusion in the enemy camp tend to be highly subjective. This approach to defining enemies runs the risk of dissipating American efforts and precipitating threats where none presently exist." (Conetta, 2006).

The strategy of the "long war" is finally revealed as the cover for US "claim-staking" to dissuade other rival powers or potential regional hegemons, in particular China according to the QDR, "against a proscribed behavior (or path of development) by persuading an opponent that it is unlikely to achieve its ends at an acceptable cost." (Conetta, 2006). As the economic and military gap with China is bound to narrow in the coming decades, the US may be able to limit China's future options in other ways, but that will depend on the outcome of the "long war." (Conetta, 2006). Ultimately, what unites the two strategic vectors is that it emphasizes the maintenance of US primacy as an overarching goal and approaching the long war as integral to that effort as a means of dissuasion to future rival powers (Conetta, 2006).

Mindanao is an arena of "claim-staking by the US whose presence is justified by the "war on terror" or what is now known as the "long war."

While China is busy in Manila buying-off through its economic diplomacy the oligarchic elite by offering enormous sums for infrastructure development with few strings attached, the US has concentrated its aid money in Mindanao to serve its strategic ends. Given the unreliability of the Philippines as a bulwark against China, the US is hedging its relations with a rising China by assisting the rise of strong neighbors along China's periphery and specifically this does not include the Philippines but relies on India, Indonesia and Vietnam (Twining, 2007).

As the Philippine center of economic gravity (i.e. the taipans are investing heavily in the Chinese mainland) shifts to China and draws the Philippines to its orbit, the US is hedging by cultivating its relationship with the Moros in Mindanao, particularly the rebel movements represented by the MILF and the MNLF. The United States Institute for Peace (USIP) Philippine Facilitation Project, which was supposed to dialogue with the MILF for a negotiated political settlement of the Moro struggle for self-determination, ended this year and has not been renewed because the US is shifting from Track 2 diplomacy to Track 1 diplomacy with the MILF by dealing directly with the MILF through US embassy personnel and not through intermediaries like USIP.

The current US policy is to help the peace process along towards a peace agreement between the MILF and the Philippine government. This policy allows the Philippine government breathing space to put its economic and governance house into order while at the same time curries favor with the Moros desirous of an end to their conflict situation.

If the peace process drags on, the US will have to step-in eventually to apply the necessary pressure to the Philippine government to offer substantial concessions to the Moros to forge a peace agreement. While others have said that a peace agreement is not necessary for US aims in Mindanao, they forget to mention that it is actually the peace process that facilitates the US entry into Moro homelands otherwise without the peace process and a modicum of stability where there is an ongoing ceasefire between the MILF and the Philippine government, the situation would be more like Somalia or Afghanistan with daily attacks and ambuscades or a situation of low-intensity guerilla warfare which might pull the Americans to fight in a war that is not their own and provides no strategic rationale since what they want is just a military presence in the area.

Among the wildest scenarios if the Philippine government is not able to forge a peace agreement with the Moros and war breaks out again in Mindanao, is that the Sulu Archipelago might break-off or spin-off from the rest of the Philippines through American sponsorship by invoking the 1898 Kiram-Bates treaty wherein the US granted the then Sultanate of Sulu the status of a protectorate. The protectorate was unilaterally cancelled by the US subsequently but the Moros of Sulu were not a party to it so it is not inconceivable that it may be invoked by the US as a form of intervention. Breaking-off Sulu to be its protectorate would mean that the US can establish a permanent base in Sulu plus there is the potentially huge hydrocarbon bonanza in the Sulu Sea where US oil supermajor, Exxon, is already engaged in oil and gas exploration. The US even if it is desirous only of Sulu as a base of operations would have to use the MILF, the bulk of whose forces are in Central Mindanao, as a hedge against the AFP and similar to the Anbar Awakening strategy in Iraq it would have to arm the MILF to keep the AFP occupied in mainland Mindanao. Eventually, the Philippine government would have to concede that it did not have the military power to ensure Philippine territorial integrity and may just ask for Chinese assistance to keep its war effort going and setting-up a stage for proxy war between the Chinese and the US. This scenario sounds inconceivable but stranger things have happened in history.

The best option then for the Philippine government and the US government in order to avoid serious destabilization in Mindanao and the Sulu archipelago is to complete the peace process and sign a peace agreement with the MILF as soon as possible wherein a Moro Homeland emerges as an anchor of stability in the region.

# # # #

I will write more about the implications for other countries like Japan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, etc. regarding the Mindanao scenario.

The Root Cause of Electoral Fraud, Violence and Vote-Vending in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao

By: Algamar A. Latiph

Once again we witnessed the nasty politics of violence and flood of allegations of vote rigging in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. What has been largely ignored is the region’s prevailing poverty, political and socioecomic inequalities where electoral fraud and violence are rooted. United Nations’ official Topfler Klaus said that “when people are denied access to clean water and air to meet their basic human needs, we see rise of poverty, ill-health and a sense of hopelessness. Desperate people can resort to desperate solutions.”

Being consistently listed in the “Bottom 10 (2003)” of the Philippine Human Development Report 2005, the five provinces of ARMM confirmed their sorry state of inequalities and ebbing human development. They occupy PHDR’s “Bottom 10” in its category of the: Most Poor Provinces; Human Development Index (where Basilan, Maguindanao, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi are in the lowest rank); Per Capita Income (except Lanao del Sur); Basic Enrollment (except Tawi-Tawi), and; Gender Development Index (except Lanao del Sur).

As regards life expectancy, they placed at the lowest with Tawi-Tawi at 51.2 years (PHDR 2005). The National Anti-Poverty Commission’s Summaries of the 40 Poorest of the Poor Municipalities disclosed that 65% of the municipalities are from ARMM of which three are among the 13 municipalities where election failed on May 14, 2007. The NAPC’s database, likewise, revealed that the region’s 351,230 households have no access to water, this is equivalent to one-third of its registered voters.

These inequalities result to 1.8 million migrants all over the country in search of opportunities. Beyond the region’s boundaries, discrimination and exclusion confront Muslims thereby narrowing their choices. Job hiring, school admission, house leasing among others are just few instances of discrimination. Out of the 663 inmates in Camp Karingal ’s Women Jail Dormitory Facility, 94 come from ARMM (2005 data from the Muslim Legal Assistant Foundation). This is 14% of the jail’s population which is sharply disproportionate with the Muslims’ less than 2% population in National Capital Region. None of the inmates finished secondary school; they found themselves living in slum areas and all are unemployed.

On the other hand, perception of the 47% of the Filipinos is that Muslims are terrorist/extremists according to the Pulse Asia Ulat ng Bayan March 2005. It also found that 55% believed that Muslims are prone to run “amok” and about 33% to 44% have anti-Muslim bias. It is surprising however that only 14% of the respondents had experience interaction with Muslims while 58% based their judgment from media. It show how media’s negative portrayal of Muslims unduly affect stereotyping. In the later part of the election candidates’ theatrics in the media unraveled their stereotyping, and derision of the region’s people as cheaters with their culture of violence.

The region has experienced centuries of violent and painful history in defending their freedom from foreign domination. The 20th century was highlighted by exhaustion from struggle from the systematic policy of driving them out of their fertile ancestral land in which they are now a minority. The densely militarized region is host to 1.38 Million internally displaced persons brought about by armed conflict from 2000 to 2004. Since 1971, the armed conflict claimed 120,000 lives.

As a body politic, ARMM meets the profile of a failed region where it did not only breed electoral violence but, to an extreme, a terrorist group—Abu Sayyaf Group. The current political violence is a sad reality of Moro versus Moro. It is a violence devoid of any political ideologue neither personal animosity. Owing to the absence of choices within the region, politicians are not motivated by power and prestige but a control of the limited wealth in the local units or districts—the Internal Revenue Allotment or Pork Barrel Fund. A victory in election will secure a three-year uninterrupted flow of millions of money. Politicians spend millions to buy votes since “return-of-investment” is assured. The scenario in the region’s politics is that the cost of violence is worth an investment. That is the reason that politicians’ drive to ensure victory and the sense of losing the election increase political tensions and, at times, result to bloodshed.

In abstract, a ballot is more than a piece of paper; it is a paper where the highest expression people’s supremacy in governance is cast. But this exists only in law books. In ARMM the ballot has yet to serve its constitutional utility of building a “just and humane society.” Though it lost its altruistic value, the ballot is not a meaningless paper but a commodity that can yield money worth more than the expected delivery of public goods and services. And can be used as leverage in accessing basic human subsistence.

In The End of History and the Last Man, Francis Fukuyama states that Philippines is “masks [by] enormous disparities in wealth, prestige, status, and power, which these elites can use to control the democratic process.” The region’s political and socioeconomic inequalities had given birth to political slavery where political dynasty gestated and, in exceptional cases, political warlordism evolved. In this system, open political participation is systematically eliminated denying the possibility of equal access to public office in order to institutionalize political monopoly. It is a process of selection among members of the family instead of free election. It is based on ones’ influence in the family rather than platform of government. Qualification, competency and character play no role. Public accountability succumbs to bloodline loyalty.

Patronage politics thrives because of the political symbiotic-dependency between the politicians and the poverty-stricken majority. The former provides for basic human subsistence in exchange of the latter’s continued patronage. Supporters will be in a three-year payroll that would somehow satisfy basic human needs for job, food and health. Being of limited choice, one has no sufficient freedom to break the bond. Freedom and liberty are elusive to men with empty stomach whose faculties are too infirm to exercise freewill.

A different scenario however exist in the case of political warlordism where fear and reign of terror is employed to assure political submission; the leverage of money-politics plays a minimal role. The will of the people is snatched by the barrel of the gun. On the other hand, there is phenomenon on the increasing numbers druglord-turned-politician. In Lanao del Sur it is an open-secret that there are at least seven of them holding mayor position. And there is anticipation that they will control the provincial seat as well as the congressional post in the near future.

Family kinship contributes to the perpetuation of warlordism where family members serve as foot soldiers. More often than not, the history of rido (clan feud) among the candidates fuels electoral violence. This is the underlying cause on the failure of election in the 13 municipalities in Lanao del Sur on May 14, 2007. Likewise, the technical aspect of the election aids dynasty and warlordism in preserving their political domination. Instead of modern electronic voting which is free from human intervention what is used is the Jurassic process of paper voting on the sheets of ballots, election returns, statement of votes, and certificate of canvass which can be physically hijacked and doctored. The current process gives election staff wider latitude of discretion making it susceptible to bribery and intimidation.

Vote-rigging in the national level is attributable to national candidates themselves being logically the sole beneficiary of the cheating facilitated thru their operators and their political disciples in the region. Cheating with respect to local positions is very remote as they are under the scrutiny of watchful eyes of the local candidates. National candidates’ absence of concrete agenda and ideological principle in governance intended to alleviate the region’s inequalities thereby lacking any campaign platform to attract votes in the region. It is no wonder that the region perceived that the “government is the principal party to blame and hopelessness under the present set-up.” (PHDR 2005).
In terms of representation, political opportunities are reserved for the few elites. Philippines is “a society dominated by social elite, most often of large landowners, who are neither tolerant of other classes nor efficient entrepreneurs,” according to Francis Fukuyama. This is a bitter fact but its degree of impact is worst with respect to ARMM.

More than three quarters of the members of the House of Representative belong to political dynasty; the Senate is not an exception. While the Lower House is equalized by geographical representation, Senate’s (including the Senators-elect) balance of power is iniquitously tilted toward imperial Manila where half come from NCR (12% of national population) and each provinces of Cavite, Sorsogon, Iloilo, and Zambales have two. The ARMM which has 10% of the population has yet to have its Senator for a decade and without Sen. Pimentel, Mindanao would not have any representation.

It may be argued that this unequal representation is tempered by the creation of ARMM. This is far from truth. The Office of the Regional Governor, has yet to be freely elected. At present, it is Malacanang’s anointment. Since its creation, elections were postponed eight times; and there were eight instances where ARMM officials’ term of offices were extended by the Congress without election. Apart from this, the Southern Philippines Development Authority was inactivated by virtue of Executive Order No. 149 for almost five years, it was activated only few months ago.

It seemed that the root causes of the fraud and violence are not appealing to politicians as well as the media that it rarely have their equal attention. The region gets that extraordinary interest only when there is blood-letting during election and armed conflict. In this election the question on Moro Problem and inequalities have been hardly taken seriously. What was underscored in the media is the issue on who will control Congress rather than what Congress can do to the failing region. This political timidity is not surprising. Congress is dominated by northern politics, its members’ approach and perception to the region’s inequity is subjective than structural. “Dominant groups tend to be unaware of social inequalities… [they] tended to see person-related causes of war [in this case political violence], while non-dominant Muslims prioritized structural causes of the conflict.” (Montiel, C.J. and Macapagal, E.J., Effects of Social Position on Societal Attributions of an Asymmetric Conflict, Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 43, No. 2, 2006, pp. 219-227).

When job, health care, education, food and water, and physical security are wanting choices are shut off. The hapless marginalized people become vulnerable and exposed to exploitation aggravated by government’s impotence to guarantee human security. Nobel laureate W.A. Lewis in his Theory of Economics pointed out that increase in per capita income “gives a man greater control of his environment, and thereby increases his freedom.” But the State has failed to create a condition in which human development and security can be realized; where people choices and opportunities are much wider and where they could have greater control of their environment. Today’s politics however is not that encouraging: it is built on a high wall of intense and uncompromising political antagonism where constructive political cooperation is jettisoned.

It is Congress’ constitutional duty to dismantle dynasty. Unfortunately conflict of interest exist, Congress itself is ruled by different species of political dynasties. Legislative measures to make IRA and Pork Barrel spending more accountable and transparent are far from its agenda. International development agencies, who are pouring billions of pesos in ARMM, are not that helpful in making the country and other institutions more accountable on fund they received to alleviate the region’s inequalities. This gives wide perception that profits are taken out of the region’s misery. It is disturbing on how the visible political warlords exist in a society claiming to be governed by rule of law. It will not require a legislation to disarm private armies, with the military might of the State it is sufficient to destroy their existence. With these bleak scenarios and the political oblivion on the issues concerning the Bangsamoro, the ruling dynasties and warlords, therefore, will flourish while the cycle of electoral fraud, violence, and vending will persist.

It would appear that the region’s human development’s figures show that Bangsamoro, decades, has been denied of their right to live with human dignity.

The Challenge Facing Moro Inteligencia

FROM THE PLAINS OF KUTAWATO
By: Atty. Zainudin S. Malang (LL.M., I.M.R.I., J.D.)

THE CHALLENGE FACING MORO INTELIGENCIA

Upon reading the text of my lecture on the development challenges in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, a friend asked me why I only limited my discussion to basic economic issues. My reply to him was that the topic assigned to me under the training design was macro-economics and discussion thereof have a tendency to be limited to basic issues.

However, I also pointed out to him that there is a far more fundamental reason why I stuck to the basics and this has something to do with the challenges facing members of the Moro intellectuals.

About the many challenges – be it economic, political, security, social - facing our area which for decades has been beset by armed conflicts, let me say that in and by themselves, these issues are already daunting in their complexity. But when one tries to correlate these challenges with each other, that complexity is multiplied many times fold. And as we – the intellectuals, the bureaucrats, the leadership - try to find our way in this complex labyrinth of inter-related problems, there is a real risk that we will lose our common understanding of our situation, we will lose sight of our common narrative. Once that happens, we will end up prescribing all sorts of different and inconsistent solutions and start pulling our Bangsa in opposite policy directions. So much for the “best and brightest” being the hope of our community. That is why we need to put forth a common understanding of the basics of our situation before we can offer concrete solutions.

Be that as it may, let me also say that we do not have the luxury of time. To state the obvious, we – our Bangsa – is under time pressure. Thus, once we have put forth a common narrative of the fundamentals of our conditions - after we have deconstructed our misconceptions and re-examined our assumptions - then we should proceed forthwith to coming up with specific solutions. And this brings me to the next point.

We are all aware of the challenges to our Bangsa. But, besides coming up with a common narrative, what is the challenge to the Moro Inteligencia - the ones my friend calls “the best and the brightest”? That challenge, I firmly believe, is learning how to think out of the box in finding solutions to our problems. Why is this a challenge?

Well, sadly, I have seen many friends commit the mistake of assuming that the security, development, and socio-political models and concepts they have learned from their many studies and training can be readily applied to our community “lock, stock, and barrel”. Having studied at the Ateneo, University of the Philippines, Asian Institute of Management, and even prominent foreign schools, our paradigms were shaped by these institutions and in the process, we forgot that the works we have read in these schools were written about, for, and by non-Moros. In general, the concepts and models that were developed in these schools were based on their experience as a society, not ours. For sure, there are lessons we can draw from these. But we should always bear in mind that these models have a set of assumptions for them to work and we need to examine those assumptions to determine if they exist in our community. We must re-examine, in the words of John Nash, the “governing dynamics” underlying their theories. Well and good if, after examining their assumptions, we can conclude that they are applicable to our conditions. Otherwise, we must modify.

Indeed, as any social scientist would tell us, any model can be useful provided it is applied to the right environment – emphasis on the phrase “right environment”. And this has been the pitfall of many proposed solutions and projects in the ARMM. Either there has been little effort at creating the right environment for peace, developmental, or socio-political interventions in our area or little has been done to modify these models to the local environment. That is what I mean by thinking out of the box. And this, again, brings me back to my earlier point. We can only successfully modify these models if we have a unified understanding of the basics of our conditions. If we fail to do so, then that old maxim will come to haunt the Moro inteligencia – of having adopted “the right solution to the wrong problem”.

This is basically the same assessment I have been giving to international developmental agencies, peace agencies, and even government agencies who have asked why, notwithstanding their many developmental interventions and projects, the Human Development Index in the ARMM has gone down rather than up. I told them that far too many of their consultants and far too few of their projects have been informed by the local conditions in our area. By conditions, I refer not only to the tangible physical conditions but the more important but less visible socio-political conditions. Thus, I suggested that they should involve Moros not only in project implementation but more importantly, in project identification and design. The assumption, of course, is that we know more about our situation and are therefore better equipped to identify which problems should be prioritized and to propose viable solutions thereto. But again, this assumption will only hold true if we are able to meet the challenge I discussed above.

Allah has given Manusyaa the ability to think logically. This Akal is not only a God-given gift. It is also a religious duty to exercise it. Therefore, the challenge to Moro intellectuals is to be scientific, systematic, logical, and creative in our thought-process as we navigate through the vast problems laid out before us.