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MARAWI
is not the heartland of the Bangsamoro. Neither is Jolo,
nor Cotabato. Definitely not the Basilan capital.
Liguasan Marsh is a far-off choice.
Where is
the heartland of the Bangsamoro?
Manila, my
birthplace, Rajah Sulayman’s town by the Pasig River in
what is now Intramuros, is the heartland of Bangsamoro.
His palace protected by his palisade preceded Malacañang.
This
claim will jolt, startle, incense many of those weaving
their dreams and rhetorics, their historical tapestry,
their political and sociological rendering about a
Bangsamoro that could even aspire to become an
independent state, closely Islamic or secular.
Let a
Maranao ask: Can I plan my life as a migrant in Jolo,
Cotabato, the Basilan capital or the Liguasan Marsh and
find fulfillment for myself and my family?
Let a
Tausog, Maguindanaon,Iranon, or Yakan ask if they could
find fulfillment as migrants in the Muslim areas not
their own.
I would
hazard a guess. The answer is no.
I
remember a few years back writing in my column “Primer”
in Zamboanga Today about three people from Basilan in a
jeepney bound for the municipality of Maluso from
Isabela. One regaled her companions with her sale of
pearls and of her sister’s CD business in Quiapo, how
she would go to the goldsmiths of Bulacan to complement
her Zamboanga-procured items. This was a Muslim Filipina
freely moving from one part of the country, the south,
to a point north, with Manila as base.
It is
said that one swallow does not make a summer. A thesis
or a dissertation cannot pass muster by just alluding to
three women in a jeepney. But variations of this talk
are going all over the Muslim areas. By the directions
of their feet, you shall know them. The sentiment might
not be well-articulated, certainly not reported and
studied; but in the mind, in the deep subconscious of
the majority of Muslim Filipinos, the nationality is
implanted: Filipino, not Maranao, not Tausog, ot Yakan,
not Iranon, not Muslim, not Moro.
The
traditional scholarship is that when a Maranao, Tausog,
Maguindanaon, Iranon, or Yakan is asked about his
nationality, the answer is Maranao, Tausog, etc.; or
that he is a Muslim. This is repeated over and over to
stress the nonidentification with Filipino, with the
entity called the Philippines.
To say
one is Maranao is to affirm one’s ethnicity. To say one
is Muslim is to declare a religious affiliation. But one
has to belong to a state; it is uncomfortable to be
stateless.
How many
Muslims in the Philippines, if asked, would say their
nationality is Moro?
I
believe not a significant number. And even if they say
that, what state would admit them?
Bangsamoro became a catchword from the latter part of
1960 onward. If it is successfully pushed as a cohesive
rallying collective for Muslim Filipinos, it would still
find its way to its heartland, Manila. This is
inevitable.
The
later part of 1960 and mid-1970 saw a full-scale
rebellion in the Southern Philippines and saw the birth
of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the
Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). But the period
also revealed that in the uneven course of Philippine
history, which includes the Muslims, the majority of the
Muslims in the Philippines feel, believe and act
Filipino.
From the
epicenter of conflict in Cotabato, Lanao,
Sulu,Tawi-Tawi and Basilan, the Muslims spread in great
numbers in Mindanao, on a scale wider than when the
sultanates were at their peak.
They
settled in the Visayas. They went farther north, to
Manila, Central Luzon, Bicol, the Cordilleras, Ilocos.
When they did, they expected and were received as
countrymen, as Filipinos in all parts of the country.
This is
the great reverse migration, a relentless northward
movement, a returning to the Manila area some five
centuries after they were driven back south as a result
of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi’s conquest of Rajah Sulayman’s
Manila in 1571.
It is
time the University of the Philippines (UP) Islamic
Studies Center and Mindanao State University (MSU),
funded by the national government, apply themselves to
the study of this phenomenon and help clarify and define
for the Muslim Filipino, the national and international
communities the situation in the country today. If these
institutions cannot at once address this task, perhaps
the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila (PLM) can take the
initiative. In the shorter term, this will provide a
direction for the peace process being undertaken by the
national government and the MNLF and MILF.
1571:
Manila ascendant
IN 1571
Manila already had ascendancy over the Laguna de Bay
lake towns, Cavite and Batangas, Bulacan and upward
north to Pampanga.
Panday
Pira, the famous cannon maker, was from Pampanga. “On
its site, after Goiti had sacked Manila, the Spaniards
would find ‘much iron and copper, as well as culverins
and cannon which had just been begun’ side by side with
moulds of clay and wax, one of which was for a cannon 17
feet long. They were the work of Panday Pira,Soliman’s
Pampangan cannon maker who, after his master’s death,
would become the foremost cannon maker in the colony.”
Three
paragraphs from Ferdinand E. Marcos’s Tadhana: The
History Of The Filipino People allow for a fuller
perspective of Rajah Sulayman: “Rajah Soliman saw the
place that Manila could take in the process of growth
being then evolved by the fortified towns toward the
construction of ever larger political units. To this
view he was impelled by what may be called native pride,
for lack of a better term, the powerful antecedent of
the then still-unformed sense of nationalism and which
only one man before him, Lapu-Lapu of Mactan, had
displayed in considerable and meaningful measure. And
his view reached beyond the Manila-Lubang-Mindoro
triangle, toward Borneo [where he married a sultan’s
daughter], across the Visayas [whose inhabitants he
seemed to despise for their submission to Spain] and
Mindanao [where his people traded with some
‘extraterritorial’ privileges], and even toward China
[whose citizens he admitted liberally as residents, most
of whom would cast their lot with him against Legazpi].
An impatient and headlong energy propelled the man,
probably the first Filipino imbued with political acumen
and a historical sense. He saw the new and supple forces
working in his island world, and understood with
instinct rather than intellect that history stood at the
palisade by the sea. He would set forth to confront it
with a doubtful tool, the imperfect experience of a
widening social coalition.”
The
account goes on: “As the Spaniards approached from the
bay, the natives, knowing that the ‘governor had come
with his entire force to settle upon their land,’ set
fire to Manila and crossed over to Tondo, the village of
Lacandola. It was two o’clock in the afternoon, in the
middle of May.
“Lacandola came out in a little boat to welcome Legazpi
in peace, suggesting that the Spaniard confer with Raha
Soliman and Laya, the Raha Matanda, who had ‘taken up
arms the past year against the master-of-camp.’ It was
agreed that the Spaniards would not go over to the right
side of the Pasig to Tondo. They would remain on the
left side, which had been burned, for Legazpi knew it
would be easy to fortify. By virtue of this accord, the
adelantado disembarked on May 19, 1571, and occupied the
triangular piece of land on the mouth of the Pasig,
which would become the walled city of Manila.”
Note
that Rajah Sulayman married a daughter of a sultan of
Borneo. After two generations, when the Manileños staged
their rebellions against the Spaniards, they still hoped
for assistance from Borneo. Not that they were alienated
from the sultanate of Sulu, but they were aware the
Suluans recognized the ascendancy of Borneo.
These
accounts are mostly from Spanish sources. Nevertheless,
these do not diminish Rajah Sulayman’s stature. It would
be enlightening if our scholars could delve into the
salsilas or royal records of Borneo.
In the
watch of Foreign Affairs Secretary Raul Manglapus, I
suggested a Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA)
documentary on the reverse migration, with a view to
distribute this in the Philippines and Muslim countries.
The Foreign Service Institute came up with a script and
a budget, but no one can tell if the project
materialized.
The DFA,
Office on Muslim Affairs and the Bit-iara Philippines
Foundation later organized the first national conference
of presidents of Muslim associations outside the
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. The venues were
the Philippine International Convention Center and the
Maharlika Village.
Secretary Manglapus delivered a lecture at the King
Abdulaziz University in Jeddah. He noted the
significance of Quiapo Church and the Golden Mosque,
representing the two great religions, standing so close
to each other—and both only a short distance from
Malacañang in San Miguel. He stressed that the Muslim
experience was an integral part of Philippine history.
Islam, he said, was spreading to the full length of the
archipelago, from Tawi-Tawi to Ilocos. Islam and the
Muslim Filipinos were spreading out, not trapped and
cornered in an enclave in Mindanao. The lecture was well
received in Saudi Arabia.
A few
years ago, there was a controversy over the installation
of the 40-foot Lapu-Lapu statue, the tallest in the
Philippines, in the Luneta. It stood for a while, was
removed, and then restored near the Department of
Tourism. The sculptor, Sajid Imao, said he got inspired
in his craft and got the break he needed when I had him
commissioned to do a full statue of Gen.Florencio
Medina, the father of nuclear energy in the Philippines.
He was then in his last year in the UP College of Fine
Arts. My relationship with the Imaos dated back to 1969
when his father, National Artist Abdulmari Imao, was
invited to an art exhibition in Paris. Abdulmari could
not procure the brass material he needed. As special
consultant to Gen. Carlos Romulo, then UP president and
education secretary, I resorted to some name-dropping
and wrote the US ambassador. In no time, I got a call
to pick up from the embassy grounds a truck full of
brass shell casings from Clark Field Air Base.
The
appointment by Mayor Alfredo Lim of lawyer Adel Tamano—who
took up law at the Ateneo de Manila University and his
Master of Laws at Harvard University—as president of the
PLM was very propitious as it ushered in many symbolisms
that could refresh history. The PLM is in Intramuros,
inside the site of Rajah Sulayman’s palisade. Adel (Adelantado?)
as head symbolizes that the Muslim has finally returned
to the core city, to the heartland of the Bangsamoro.
The
university, of course, is not the seat of political
power; that rests in City Hall, just outside Intramuros. The
university is the highest symbol of Manila’s public
educational system which radiates another form of power
and influence. In this wise, it would be best if the
mayor allows the university president to take a leave of
absence as spokesman of the opposition so he could lead
the institution to new heights of excellence.
Adel’s
appointment is lent further significance by the presence
of other experts, among them Bae Bayolan
Tamano-Marohombsar, Mayor Lim’s consultant on Muslim
affairs. Bayol is the Bai a labi sa panorogan, or
sultanate of Kablangan, one of the oldest royal houses
of Lanao. She is president of the Marawi Rotary Club 101
and was past president of the Inner Wheel Club of
Manila-Marawi.
According to Bayol, the Historical and Cultural Heritage
Commision is chaired by Carmen Guerrero Nakpil, and
Gemma Cruz-Araneta also sits as a member. No two ladies
could be more distinguished. In 1969 when I launched the
Ninth Ray Movement, to add the ninth ray to the eight
rays in the sunburst of the Philippine flag in order to
represent the struggle for freedom of the Muslims and
the cultural communities (now indigenous people), I
sought Guerrero-Nakpil’ s moral support and
endorsement. She came out with a classic, “A republic
for a ray.”
As
coordinator of the Carlos P. Romulo Literary Awards, I
again approached her for moral support, lending her
prestige to the contest by chairing the essay category.
Gemma,
on the other hand, inaugurated the Aga Khan Museum at
the MSU in Marawi. Earlier, she was conferred the title
of Bai a labi or princess and was naturally stunning in
her Muslim attire, but this is an observation repeated
thousands of times over.
In the
June 15 issue of the Philippine Star Carmen Guerrero-Nakpil
wrote: “The untold story of Araw ng Maynila.”
These
were the conditions in Maynila on June 24, 1571. Knowing
them, would anyone venture to say that this was the day
life began for Manila and the Manilans?
This
year a better perspective endowed Araw ng Maynila, one
closer to historical truths. A parade of Filipino
Muslims, in their traditional garb of malong and veils
for the women, and pants, jackets and kris for the men,
marched together from the mosque in Quiapo to the tip
of Fort Santiago, the site of Sulayman’s palisaded
palace. They were joined by school youth dressed in
Tagalog finery of the period to represent the datu and
the Tagalog population.
PLM
president Adel Tamano presided over the ceremonies and
spoke on the historical background of Araw ng Maynila. A
flower wreath was laid on the grave of the Adelantado
Legaspi in San Agustin Church in remembrance of his role
in the development of Manila.
With
more and more of them actively playing crucial roles in
modern-day life, one hopes we all will emerge much less
ignorant of history. Here’s to Rajah Sulayman’s Maynila,
the forgotten heartland of the Bangsamoro. |
