On Osettia, secession and the Bangsamoro

There is no chance for me to ignore the Bangsamoro conflict especially the howitzers breaking through the bellowing winds of the North Cotabato rice fields. The sound of their barrels are giving a grumbling sensation to the ear, which is analogous to the grumblings of the stomachs of the more than 100, 000 displaced residents infested by the fighting between the AFP and Commander Ombra Kato's lost command. Did I hear there was another breakaway group among the bandits' ranks?

Switching channels I went over yet another crisis brought by ethnocentric delusion in South Osettia, a province in the Republic of Georgia which is struggling to secede from the country who has just tasted its sovereignty not long ago. It makes no surprise that when the Georgian parliament declared a state of war last Saturday, Russia, who has been too anxious to assist secessions from its former regions pledged to back the Osettian struggle, deploying its Black Sea fleet off the Georgian coast.

It is noteworthy that George Herbert Warlord Bush, Jr. has expressed his deep “concern” about the catastrophe. With Georgian troops concentrated in Iraq to support his war, too few are left to defend the young republic, which makes it necessary for US to call for the pacifying of the situation. Yet the catch is that at a period when US-Russian relations are thought to have been getting more civil than before, will Georgia become a factor to severe their ties again? So ring the hints in my ears, just like the Star Wars theme indicating Darth Vader's entrance.

The Volokh Conspiracy's Ilya Somin has raised some points regarding the moral legitimacy of Osettia's secessionist struggles. He argued that secession must be seen on a “case by case basis,” and should be devoid of any precedents because such movements have their relatively differing causes or grievances doing justice for the separation. Hence it is without sense for a region to try to detach itself or create a self-governing institution or entity when in fact it has suffered no oppression under the status quo government. Furthermore, Somin also reasoned out the legitimacy of a separation according to the government to be established.

"The worse the existing government and the better the new one the secessionists are likely to set up, the stronger the justification for secession. A secessionist movement that seeks to establish a new state in order to engage in repression is very different from one intended to defend its own people against oppression by the central government. "

He also goes on to explain that:

The key variable is the relative quality of the central government as compared to the new regime the secessionists seek to establish.

Now let us go back to the Bangsamoro. The BJE proposal, which smells like secession in the most delicate sense (although Esperon rebutted that it isn't going to be like that), is built on soft ground, when reality has it that Philippine status quo does not suppress either of the Muslims’ rights or liberties. There is no segregation nor ethnic cleansing, neither gestures of racism that can provide them just cause to express the necessity of ”federalizing” away from others. It is clear that the MILF, who goes on blackmailing or taking hostage barangays in North Cotabato are acting only for their sole interest, and not for those who constitute Muslim Mindanao, whose immediate cry is PEACE.

The yearning for an Islamic nation is in itself a guise of racism, especially when it emanates from a source whose temperament is characterized by the extreme tendencies of emphasizing Muslim supremacy that may curtail or even take away the freedom of religion, among other important human liberties.

BREAKING MESS UPDATE: PGMA finally verified the fear of sensible Filipinos: the country must be converted to Federalism in order to solve the chaos in North Cotabato. Charter change in order to make things up? Should the Constitution be submissive to alter itself for such situation when there are other means to make peace? That clever...

ANOTHER UPDATE: The military says that 7 North Cotabato villages are now wrenched from the hands of the MILF, and some of its displaced population are going back to their homes.