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Cousins, families
Territorially, this means that national boundaries are of no concern, and cousins, families and business partners from both the Borneo and the Sulu side saw no need to worry about national identification cards.
It also means that even as the majority prefers to stick to commerce and trade, there will still be those who regard business as the product of tradition. The people who joined the petite uprising are most likely those who consider their lives inextricably linked to an “old tradition,” which sees their family histories as inextricably linked to an authority that was neither Malaysian nor Filipino. It is a primordial sentiment that has not been erased because the absence of the national state (particularly the critical educational apparatuses that could change young minds) made sure that it would be preserved.
But the speed with which this rebellion—so overrated in Manila and Kuala Lumpur—was stamped out also suggests the fragility of this old mentality. A few shots, some killed and wounded, and everyone appear to head home.
Or perhaps there is also another complementary explanation. The shootings may have surprised them, but the Sabah police most likely knew that the tension was easy to defuse. After all, those armed men at the other side of the checkpoints, were probably their relatives, business associates, even neighbors. Companies that they and their families have known and kept long before there was this imagined border that separated Borneo from Tawi-Tawi and the larger Sulu archipelago.
This brings us to a final point to consider. If this small town occupation was of historic significance, why are the two important Muslim Mindanao players keeping a distance from the Kirams and their men? Neither the fractious MNLF nor the far-stronger MILF has sent any of their battle-scarred companies to join the Kirams. And we have not heard any statements of solidarity from the spokespersons of these “movements.”
Pragmatic Moro politics
The silence, I suspect, has something to do with pragmatic politics. Like the old sultan, these two organizations have made their peace with Manila and have accepted the offer of autonomy. The MNLF and MILF are—despite misgivings—happy to be part of the Philippine geo-body.
But being movements borne out of more modern ideologies, these two organizations have very little to be in solidarity with the Sulu Sultanate. The MNLF’s secular ideology sees the sultanate as the very archaic, feudal power that had collaborated with Filipino colonialism to exploit, marginalize and repress the umma, while the MILF treats this “indigenized” political authority as pre-Islamic and hence, backward.
Besides, both would always be grateful for the Malaysian government’s support for their separatist struggle in the past. Why bite a hand that used to feed them? And why waste resources on something that had no prospects of even making a dent on Malaysian stability?
The skirmish is over and the border zone will be, as it were, back in business once again. And Manila and Kuala Lumpur may find it just prudent to let things be, to let the locals deal with the quirks of an existence, which hardly matter to the two capitals.
(Patricio N. Abinales is professor of Asian Studies, University of Hawaii-Manoa. His latest book is “Orthodoxy and History in the Muslim Mindanao Narrative” [Ateneo: 2010]. He is working on a manuscript on the Growth with Equity in Mindanao [GEM] and the American economic presence in the war zones of Muslim Mindanao. Despite his current address, he remains an official resident of Ozamiz City, northern Mindanao.)
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