Thursday, August 14, 2008 Speak out: US-crafted BJE By Kilusan Para sa Pambansang Demokrasya-Cebu
THE interventionist maneuver of the US government is again at work in Mindanao.
Using the United States Institute for Peace (USIP), the American government guided the final outcome of the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) between the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
Such guidance is ensured through the USIP Philippine Facilitation Project, 2003-2007. It is not surprising that the MOA signing was scheduled this year.
The USIP was created and is funded by the US Congress. It has made its presence felt in all areas immersed in local wars, ethnic wars, and regional conflicts.
It ensures that through their sponsored conflict resolution mode, US strategic interests are safeguarded.
The entry of the US in the peace talks followed the plea for help by the late MILF chairman Hashim Salamat to President George W. Bush in January 2003.
Washington’s commitment was hinged on MILF renouncing terrorism and Salamat made this policy public in June 2003.
The MILF has hinted on several occasions that it was approached by undisclosed US authorities on the possibility of establishing US military bases in MILF-controlled territory as part of the final peace deal.
Expectedly, the GRP-MILF draft pact on the Bangsamoro homeland provided the latter with the broad concessions.
One of this is the agreement of both parties “to invite a multinational third party to observe and monitor the actual implementation of the comprehensive compact…”
The establishment of the military installations within the BJE would serve a de facto peacekeeping role. The possibility of a US sponsored UN peace keeping force is a not farfetched.
Gen. Fortunato Abat, the former senior envoy to Beijing, said that “establishing a US military base in Mindanao would make strategic sense for Washington on several fronts, including possible future naval interventions in the South China Sea, defending Taiwan from a preemptive Chinese attack and providing a launch pad for anti-terrorist operations in Indonesia, Afghanistan and Iraq.”
The US knows that the greatest obstacle to the full realization of the Bangsamoro Juridical Entity remains to be the nation’s constitution and laws.
Yet what is happening now is a classic case of putting the cart before the horse.
Without any iota of decency, the GRP panel proceeded with the MOA without laying first the constitutional basis for it.
Obviously, the US as their masters has no respect for the laws of its neocolony as long as its actions can ensure its strategic interests.
