Do we really need BBL?

Until now, it appears to me that the Bangsamoro Basic Law is clouded in secrecy. Does the Moro community know the real score? Or are they also being kept in the dark about the proposed law? Will the law really provide the Moros in Mindanao a bright future? Or will it just establish another “kleptocracy” or fiefdom ruled by the traditional elite of the region?

The biggest problem confronting our country right now is kleptocracy that thrives in government institutions and among our leaders. This is what keeps our nation down. So why can’t the Moros just have a state of their own? Why can’t the Philippine government just let them go and run their own government?

Even our colonial masters, the Spaniards and the Americans were hard put trying to control the Moro people. Who gives us here in Manila, or in Luzon and the Visayas, the right to stop them from choosing to break away from the Philippines. Don’t they have the right to self-determination? For their children’s sake? Didn’t we harbor a similar aspiration when we were under the Spaniards and the Americans?

We have to look ourselves in the mirror and see what we, as a nation, have become. If millions of us Filipinos wish to leave our country in search of a better future, it is because their government and leaders have failed us. Are our brother Moros any different from us and do we expect them to see a different picture from the one in front of us? Why force them to be part of the Philippines if they see themselves as a different nation?

If I am wrong, then why do we need a BBL? Why? Aren’t our secular institutions enough to secure and sustain growth, peace and prosperity for Mindanao or in every part of the country, for that matter?

—JOSE SANTAMARIA, [email protected]