PASSIONATE FOR THE NATION by Ferdie Amora Pasion Goin’ Bananas Over Sabah ”The kings of Tharsis and the islands shall offer presents: the kings of the Arabians and of Saba shall bring gifts.” Psalm 72:10 (Douay-Rheims Version of the Holy Bible) The Land Below The Wind North Borneo or Sabah is one of the 13 member states of Malaysian Federation, and its easternmost state. Located on the northern portion of the big island of Borneo, it is the second largest state of Malaysia after Sarawak, which it borders on Sabah’s southwest. It also shares a border with the province of East Kalimantan of Indonesia in the south. The capital of Sabah is Kota Kinabalu (“Kota” or “Kuta” means “Fort” while “Kinabalu” is the name of a mountain nearby), formerly known as Jesselton (named after Sir Charles Jessel, the then-Vice-Chairman of the British North Borneo Company sometimes referred to as “BNBC”). Sabah is often called The Land Below The Wind, a phrase used by seafarers in the past to describe lands south of the typhoon belt. It is said that Sabah was named after the banana called “Saba” in Tagalog (which is a Malay dialect). Root of the Crisis Now, Sabah is all over the news. However, unknown to many, the most recent crisis in Sabah all began during the time of Gloria Arroyo. The Arroyo government, upon pressures coming from Washington, negotiated the so-called Memorandum of Agreement on the Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD) with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) with Malaysia as the facilitator or mediator. Before this, the Americans erased the MILF from its official list of “terrorist organizations”. What prompted the Americans to do this, you may ask. Well, it was after geologists and other scientists discovered vast amounts of oil in Sulu Sea and Liguasan Marsh coupled with vast deposits of natural gas, also within the said areas. (Petroleum Potential of the Sulu Sea Region Philippines - DOE doe.gov.ph/ER/archives/pcr/Pdf/pdf%20Sulu%20Sea%20petroleum%20potential.pdf and Liguasan Marsh Holds Billions of Dollars in Natural Gas - Misuarigmanetwork/news/story/109864/news/regions/liguasan-marsh-holds-billions-of-dollars-in-gas-misuari) It must be remembered that Malaysia effectively “stole” Sabah from us on September 16, 1963 when it accepted from Britain the sovereignty over Sabah despite the official protests of the Philippine government. Many observers therefore are asking the legitimate question of why Malaysia was made the facilitator or mediator in the MOA-AD talks. In fact, it was even in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur on August 5, 2008 that the signing of the MOA-AD was supposed to take place when the then-Ambassador of the US to the Philippines, Kristie Anne Kenney, the representatives of Pres. Arroyo, and the representatives of the MILF were already in Kuala Lumpur ready for the signing ceremonies. However, on August 4, 2008 the Philippine Supreme Court issued a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) which stopped the signing of the said agreement. It should also be recalled that on Aug. 7, 2008 armed clashes broke out in Mindanao, with MILF forces, led by MILF Commanders Umbra Kato, Bravo, Pangalian and others, occupying parts of North Cotabato and raiding towns in Lanao del Norte and Sarangani. MILF leaders blamed the attacks on field commanders impatient about the delay in the implementation of the agreement. And that on Sept. 3, 2008, after issuing conflicting statements on the government’s stand on the MILF and the agreement, Malacañang announced that it was dissolving the government peace panel and that the administration would not sign the document “in light of recent violent incidents committed by lawless violent groups.” On Oct. 14, 2008, the Supreme Court, voting 8-7, declared the MOA-AD unconstitutional and illegal, describing the process that led to its crafting as “whimsical, capricious, oppressive, arbitrary and despotic.” The Supreme Court affirmed its decision to reject the deal on Nov. 11, 2008. The Sultanate of Sulu and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) led by Nur Misuari were not included in the MOA-AD talks despite of the fact that these two entities asked to be included in the talks in order to include the issue of the recovery of Sabah for the Philippines in the said talks. The Sultanate of Sulu and the MNLF were basing their claim (that Sabah belongs to the Philippines) on several historic antecedents and legal documents including, but not limited to, the decision of the British High Court of North Borneo on December 18, 1939 wherein British Chief Justice C.F.C. Mackaskie ruled that the heirs of the Sultan of Sulu were legally entitled to payments from the British North Borneo Company (BNBC) and that (as an obiter dictum or side note to the decision) the “Philippine Government is the successor in sovereignty” of the Sultanate of Sulu. The Crisis Deliberately and Dutifully Continued When Noynoy Aquino assumed the Presidency, many Filipinos, especially those from Mindanao, thought that he would live up to his promise to be “the opposite of Mrs. Arroyo”. These Filipinos were of the belief that Noynoy will no longer push for the peace talks with the MILF considering the terroristic acts committed by MILF forces when the Supreme Court stopped the signing of the MOA-AD with a TRO. However, to everyone’s surprise (but probably not to the Americans, British and Malaysians), Noynoy simply changed some terms used in the MOA-AD with new euphemisms and proceeded to continue the talks with the MILF, this time changing the name of the MOA-AD to the “Framework Agreement” with essentially the same features including the creation of a “Bangsa Moro” political entity. Noynoy conveniently forgot the fact that one of the contentious issues in the MOA-AD was precisely the use of the term “Bangsa”, which to many, is outrageous since it connotes the creation of a new nation-state or republic similar to those of Kosovo and Timor Leste which declared their independence from Yugoslavia and Indonesia, respectively, and which declarations of independence were immediately recognized by the US, Britain and their allied countries. What is worse is that Aquino committed the very same injustices and “shortcuts” that the Arroyo government are said to be guilty of – like excluding the Sultanate of Sulu and the MNLF from the peace talks and likewise excluding the Sabah claim of the Philippines from the talks and making Malaysia, an adversarial party, again as the facilitator or mediator in the negotiations. As expected, the US and its allied countries (Britain, Japan, Australia, Turkey, among others) were made parties to the peace talks and named as the “International Contact Group”. It should be noted that Britain – which was the lessee of Sabah from the Sultan of Sulu – is also an adversarial country considering that it illegally gave Sabah to the Malaysian Federation (when it granted independence to Malaysia in 1963) without the consent of the Sultanate of Sulu. It should likewise be noted that Australia is a daughter country of Britain and a member of the British Commonwealth, that Turkey is a close ally of Britain and the US in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and that Japan is an oil-starved nation which may be interested in the oil and natural gas in Sulu Sea and Liguasan Marsh. History of Disloyalty? But looking back to history, we should not at all be surprised at the behavior of Aquino. After all, his late father was the one who exposed to the whole world the so-called “Jabidah Massacre” and the secret plan (“Operation Merdeka”) of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) to re-take Sabah by force due to the adamant refusal of the Malaysians to bring the Sabah issue under the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice (ICJ). The ICJ, of course, cannot acquire jurisdiction on a dispute if all parties to the dispute will not accede to ICJ’s arbitration. Some veterans of the Merdeka operation, who asked not to be identified, claim that Aquino’s father, Ninoy, was given by the Malaysians a copy of a false document which the AFP made sure would fall into the hands of the Malaysians because the AFP sensed that the Malaysians were already detecting something was brewing. This was said to be similar to the false document which the Allied Forces in World War II “leaked” to the Germans. The AFP, so the story goes, named the false operation as “Jabidah”, which does not mean anything, not only to mislead the Malaysians but to catch the mole inside the Philippine camp who was suspected to be supplying the Malaysians, Americans and the British with certain information on the planned re-taking of Sabah. The real name of the operation was “Merdeka” which means freedom. As it turned out, some Merdeka veterans are of the opinion that Ninoy was that mole because he could have only known about “Jabidah” from the Malaysians since it is only the Malaysians who know the operation as “Jabidah” when in fact it is “Merdeka”. It must be mentioned here that, according to Arturo Tolentino’s book “The Voice of Dissent” – in the so-called “Jabidah Massacre” – only one corpse was found, that of Lt. Eduardo Nepomuceno (a Christian AFP officer), and that only eight trainees were missing upon the roll call conducted by then-President Ferdinand Marcos himself in Corregidor Island immediately after the “massacre”. Pres. Marcos likewise ordered a nationwide search or manhunt for the missing eight trainees who may well have been deserters. Navy officials, at that time, who were expert swimmers also noted the fact that the claim of the so-called lone survivor of the “massacre” of swimming from Corregidor to the province of Cavite could not have been physically possible considering the well-known rough seas and strong currents between the island and the province. Arturo Tolentino is known for his adherence to facts. Later, it was also another relative of Pres. Noynoy Aquino under whom the Philippines deleted a phrase in its Constitution to please the Malaysians – former Pres. Cory Aquino. After Cory ousted Marcos, with the help of the Americans (and some claim with the assistance of the Malaysians, too), Cory ordered the drafting of a new Constitution later to be known as the 1987 Constitution. Under the 1987 Constitution, the phrase “and all other territories belonging to the Philippines by historic right or legal title” can no longer be found. Arturo Tolentino, the Philippines’ foremost Constitutional law expert and author of the original 1950 resolution in the House of Representatives which effectively called for the inclusion of Sabah in the territory of the Philippines, stated that this act of Cory was aimed at weakening the Philippine claim on Sabah. However, Tolentino opined that even without any Constitutional or statutory “prop”, the said claim can and will stand on its own based on the lease document between the Sultanate of Sulu and the British and on the cession document between the Sultan of Sulu, on behalf of the Sultanate, and Vice-President Emmanuel Pelaez, on behalf of the Republic of the Philippines, which ceded not only the sovereignty and dominion over Sabah to the Philippines but the title over it as well. It should likewise be remembered that the 1950 House resolution which effectively sought the inclusion of Sabah in the territory of the Philippines was not adopted by Congress because the Senate did not concur on the same due to the spirited opposition in the Senate coming from Senator Sumulong, another relative of the President Noynoy Aquino. Also, on March 25, 1963, Senator Lorenzo Sumulong delivered a privileged speech berating the Philippine claim to North Borneo (Sabah), which had been filed by President Diosdado Macapagal on June 22, 1962. Five days later, Senator Jovito R. Salonga delivered what is now considered as an immortal and classic point-by-point rebuttal to Sumulong’s speech. Sultan’s Cession of Sabah to RP Unconditional and Unwithdrawable Tolentino and some other legal experts believe that this cession of Sabah to the Philippines by the Sultan of Sulu is unconditional and unwithdrawable because the so-called condition that, “should the Philippines fail to recover Sabah, the Sultanate reserves the right to pursue the claim through other means necessary”, is NOT a condition pertaining to the cession but only to the manner by which Sabah is to be recovered. This runs counter to recent reports that the Sultan, in 1989, withdrew the cession from the Republic and gave Sabah back to the Sultanate of Sulu. All For The Sake Of Business? Not a few pundits suggest that some commercial deals entered into by the relatives of the incumbent President may have clouded his judgment with regards to the Philippine claim on Sabah. Among these deals, is Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco’s San Miguel Corporation (SMC) acquisition of three subsidiaries of American Exxon Mobil Corporation’s downstream oil business in Malaysia in August 2011 worth US$610 million which included the purchase by SMC of Esso Malaysia Berhad (Corporation), Exxon Mobil Malaysia Sdn Bhd and Exxon Mobil Borneo Sdn Bhd. The physical assets include the 88,000 barrels per day Port Dickson refinery; seven fuel distribution terminals; and about 560 refilling stations. SMC’s entry into the Malaysian downstream oil industry could be just the initial steps. Ramon S. Ang, president of the giant conglomerate, recently disclosed that with its acquisition of Exxon Mobil’s downstream assets, SMC is in a strategic position to also corner upstream deals in oil-rich Malaysia. Another such deal involves AirAsia Philippines, the local affiliate of Malaysia-based AirAsia Bhd, the largest budget carrier in Southeast Asia. Last November 2010, the Board of Investments (BOI) gave its nod to the formation of AirAsia Philippines as a joint venture between Malaysian investors and Filipino businessmen led by the President’s cousin Antonio “Tonyboy” Cojuangco Jr. Tonyboy and his Malaysian partners are expanding their operation in the Philippines with their recent acquisition of at least a 40% stake in local rival Zest Airways Inc. What now Noynoy? With the recent charges of genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes and crimes against humanity on the part of Malaysian armed forces against Filipinos in Sabah, in its efforts to suppress what it considers to be a “rebellion” or “terrorism”, the administration of Noynoy Aquino seems to have been dragging its feet in responding to these growing number of cases of alleged human rights violations. This is in stark contrast to the readiness of the Aquino Administration to prosecute all alleged human rights violations committed by Filipinos in the Philippines – the Aquinos being the so-called “champions of human rights” in the modern world – as hailed by the American government and mass media. As of this writing, the Aquino Administration and the Sultanate of Sulu are said to have been discussing the terms of “disengagement” of the forces of the Royal Sulu Army from the armed conflict in Sabah. The Filipino people are left wondering if Aquino will still pursue the Framework Agreement without the participation of the Sultanate of Sulu and the MNLF and if the Philippine claim on Sabah will still be brought to the United Nations or other international bodies just as the Administration bravely and actively brought the Scarborough Shoal and Kalayaan Islands dispute to international arbitration.
Posted on: Wed, 19 Feb 2014 21:20:58 +0000
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