USIP calls the Big Guns

USIP calls the Big Guns

(Herman Tiu Laurel / DieHard III / The Daily Tribune / 03-30-2015 MON)

 

Why BS Aquino is still so bullheaded in pushing the BangsaMoro Basic Law (BBL) despite the collapse of his public trust and approval ratings and in the face of his Senate supporters urging him to wait for a new administration in about a year’s time continues to baffle the mind.  Neither can he be presumed to be following the logic of peace, since even the peace panel officials on both sides have admitted: Signing the BBL would not stop other rebel groups and minorities from using force to attain their own objectives.  What or who then can exert so much pressure as to compel a supposed president to act so adversely against his own interest and legacy?

 

One has to look back to the history of the BBL to understand.  Here we can recall the near total demise of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) after President Joseph Estrada demolished its network of rebel camps, including its Camp Abubakar headquarters.  That forced its leader Hashim Salamat to flee to the coddling arms of his sponsors in Kuala Lumpur.

 

In desperation, Salamat wrote a plea in 2003 (no doubt with Malaysian and British prodding) to then US President George W. Bush--an appeal that led to what G. Eugene Martin and Astrid S. Tuminez wrote as a report in Feb. 1, 2008, which we quote below:

 

“’Toward Peace in the Southern Philippines,’ A Summary and Assessment of the USIP (United States Institute for Peace--in which Board sits the CIA, NSA, et al.) Philippine Facilitation Project, 2003-2007…  In 2003, the US Department of State asked USIP to undertake a project to expedite a peace agreement between the two sides (MILF and Government of the Philippines)… US policymakers must give higher priority to the… negotiations … When an agreement is reached… (this will) accomplish US foreign policy goals… (And because) of its ability to deal with non-state actors and sensitive issues underlying civil conflict, USIP can be a useful instrument for advancing US interests.”

 

Who could make the EU and Japan get involved, sponsoring seminars, contributing funds, and inviting BS Aquino to meet MILF representatives in Tokyo, on a purely Philippine domestic issue?  Only be the US could.

 

But even the internationalization of the issue could not convince the Filipino people on the BBL, especially after the Mamasapano barbarity of the MILF and the incoherence of all the pro-BBL Filipino patsies and their MILF cohorts in defending the BBL proposal.

 

So it’s time for the “non-state actors” to be called in to exercise “soft power” on the Filipino public to sell the BBL.

 

Last Friday, BS Aquino formed a “peace council” to “educate the public on (the) proposed BBL,” naming Cardinal Tagle, Big Business tycoon Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala, ex-Chief Justice Hilario Davide, and BS Aquino in-law Ambassador Howard Dee.  Only two really count, representing powerful social institutions that twice helped oust presidents.

 

In 1986, Cardinal Sin called his flock to Edsa I as Don Jaime Zobel de Ayala opened Shell’s gasoline spigots for Butz Aquino’s nationwide protest caravans.  In 2001, Sin convened Edsa II rallies against Estrada that saw Don Jaime dancing awkwardly as the elite crowd proclaimed Gloria Arroyo president.

 

Cardinal Tagle now sits in Sin’s stead while Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala (JAZA) sits at the helm of the Makati Business Club (MBC).  Both represent, by historical and business ties, the Philippines’ umbilical cord to Western civilization and economic subsidiarity.

 

On the BBL, these Big Guns among the “non-state actors” are now called in to be in the firing line, as they were when the fledgling independent Asian leader Ferdinand Marcos spread his wings and opened relations with the Socialist World (among other issues) and Erap pushed to establish a truly sovereign security policy for Mindanao.

 

Calling in these Big Guns reflects the primordial importance of the BBL to US “foreign policy goals” in Asia.  In this era of the rise of China, the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), the AIIB (Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank), etc., 70 years of US hegemony in this part of the world is undoubtedly threatened.

 

The US is thus racing against time and history to restore its preeminence in Asia by way of the “Asia Pivot” that would see 60 percent of its military forces deployed to the region--and the BBL obviously plays a key role in this.

 

But given that the pervasive interference of the US that led to the Mamasapano tragedy is as much to blame as BS Aquino is in the BBL debacle, they are now tapping the “non-state” actors to assuage the nation.

 

Will the Filipino people have their legs pulled again by these Big Guns?  Let’s hope not.  They should, by now, have sufficiently learned from the endless betrayals they have experienced--from Edsa I to Edsa II and, now, the Mamasapano massacre.

 

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