On the issue of secession and the Moro people�s right to self-determination
In the political arena, the right to self-determination may be realized through any of the following means: First, the enactment of special laws that shall guarantee the equality of all groups within a state and the concomitant abrogation of all restrictions that may bar the participation of minority groups; second, regional autonomy; third, federation; and fourth, secession.
Due to the small and scattered character of their economies and communities, the vast majority of ethno-linguistic groups in the Philippines do not assert their right to secede. Historically, these groups have often united with the rest of the Filipino people to resist foreign colonialists. For them, the only road to liberation from oppression and exploitation is through their participation in the national-democratic revolution in unity with the entire Filipino people.
Among minorities today, the emergence of organized Moro forces asserting and actually fighting for their right to secede from the reactionary government is a distinct development. The Moro National Liberation Front/Bangsamoro Army (MNLF/BMA) has a place in the history of the Moro people as the first force ever to banner this struggle by advancing the concept of Moro nationalism and building unity among the various small ethno-linguistic groups in Southern Mindanao.
The MNLF�s signing of the Tripoli Agreement in 1976, however, and its abandonment of armed struggle led to the gradual decline of the MNLF/BMA. In 1996, MNLF/BMA leader Nur Misuari and his minions thoroughly betrayed the Moro struggle when they entered into an anomalous agreement with the US-Ramos regime. In exchange for bogus autonomy for the Moro people (�autonomy� under an oppressive state) and a position in the reactionary bureaucracy for Misuari, the MNLF turned its back on the Moro people�s long history of armed struggle and formally accepted the Bangsamoro�s integration into the current reactionary government.
The struggle that has been abandoned by the MNLF is being continued by the Moro Islamic Liberation Front/Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Force (MILF/BIAF). The MILF/ BIAF militantly stand against the reactionary enemy and its pacification campaign.
The Bangsamoro include all oppressed and exploited sectors and classes within the Maranao, Maguindanao, Tausog, Samal, Yakan, Sanggil, Palawani, Badjao, Kalibugan, Jama-Mapun, Iranun, Kalagan and Molbog ethno-linguistic groups. Also encompassed by the term Moro are the tribes and parts of tribes as well as individuals advocating the Moro struggle for the right to self-determination, those who have a long history of political, economic and cultural relations with them and those who have long been living within defined Moro areas.
Based on this definition, an estimated 28-35% of the entire population of Mindanao at present are Moro people.
The Moro people comprise the majority of the population in the provinces of Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-tawi. They also comprise the majority in 11 municipalities in other provinces (seven in Lanao del Norte; two in Zamboanga del Norte; one in North Cotabato; and one in Palawan).
Of all the national minority groups and tribes in the Philippines, it is the Moro people who had the most advanced social system before the arrival of the Spanish colonialists. It is they who have also had the longest and most sustained history of armed resistance against the succession of colonialists that occupied their territories.
The Moro people�s right to secede from the oppressive Government of the Republic of the Philippines and form their own country has basis both in history and in present conditions. The most striking factor is their culture. Their territories have defined boundaries. There is fertile ground for the further development of Moro nationalism.
Nonetheless, Moro history, society and communities are tightly linked with the evolution of the Philippines as a country and the system engulfing the entire Filipino nation. Despite the Moro people�s continued armed resistance against foreign colonialists, their ruling class leaders have repeatedly capitulated. It is these leaders | THE MORO PEOPLE�S RIGHT TO SECEDE FROM THE OPPRESSIVE GOVERNMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES AND FORM THEIR OWN COUNTRY HAS BASIS BOTH IN HISTORY AND IN PRESENT CONDITIONS. |
who served as conduits for colonial policies that oppressed the Moro people. Later, with US imperialism�s complete domination of the Philippines, it was able to subjugate Moro society and the Moro system under the authority of the reactionary government based in Manila.
Moro communities are not exempt from the oppression and exploitation of imperialists, landlords and the big comprador bourgeoisie. In fact, the Moro people, like other national minorities in the Philippines, are among the most oppressed, exploited and systematically neglected by the counterrevolutionary state and therefore, have a big stake in the national-democratic revolution. Foreign capitalists and the local ruling classes have perpetrated the largescale grabbing and plunder of their land and natural resources. For decades, successive puppet and fascist governments have victimized them through repeated and brutal military and genocidal campaigns that have included bombings, arson and forcible displacement from their territories.
The Party and the revolutionary movement have long supported and encouraged Moro people�s organizations to assert their right to self-determination, including their right to secession, as their weapon against the reactionary state, national oppression and Christian chauvinism. It is in the interest of the Filipino and Moro peoples for Moro organizations to advance the armed struggle to assert this right.
Similarly, the national-democratic movement has always encouraged the Moro people to unite with the entire Filipino people to cooperate in overthrowing imperialism, bureaucrat capitalism and feudalism and liberate Philippine society in general and Moro society in particular from exploitation and oppression.
Alongside the national-democratic movement�s offer of revolutionary unity and cooperation with Moro organizations, it organizes the Moro people and develops revolutionary cadres and activists from their ranks. The revolutionary movement actively repudiates and resists the reactionary state�s schemes to incite Christian chauvinism among the majority against the Bangsamoro.
In the same light, the revolutionary movement repudiates and resists Moro ethnocentrism which separates the Moro struggle from the struggle of the entire Filipino people.
It is important to strengthen relations between the Moro people and the Filipino people in order to link their revolutionary movements with other people�s revolutionary forces and other oppressed peoples the world over.
Under the democratic coalition government, the Party and the revolutionary movement look forward to advancing regional autonomy in the Bangsamoro�s areas of concentration and local democratic coalition governments in areas where they are not concentrated. Such a political order will guarantee the interests of the Moro people within the people�s government, eliminate chauvinism in all its forms and strengthen the entire Filipino people�s spirit of internationalism.
This order will also facilitate the process of development of relatively backward communities and the thorough realization of national equality among the various nationalities within the people�s democratic government.
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