Bangsamoro Basic Law and the Mursid

September 28-29, 2013, I holed up in some posh hotel in Davao with a motley set of gays and transgirls to talk Basic Law and LGBT rights. We were there, supposedly, to work on a provision that would make a good insertion in the Framework of Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB) and submit it to the Transition Commission so that when and if the Moro Islamic Liberation Front made it to the seat of autonomous governance in Mindanao, we wouldn't be banished or decapitated en masse.

For the MILF's ideological tenets, HRD informed me, are informed by the Ikhwan; the Ikhwan al-Safa is a brotherhood of idealists on the fringe of Orthodox Islam. So the MILF has this Mursid as basis of their framework of governance. They have the National Mursid, they have this Mursid Division Commander, Mursid Battalion Commander, Mursid Platoon Leader, Mursid Squad Leader. If it is put into effect, you will have a hard life, dear, said HRD.

That is why, he went on, human rights groups, women rights groups, LGBT rights groups ought to really do a lot of lobbying in the framing of the Bangsamoro Basic Law.

The comers to the conference were a pretty mixed-up group, most from outside the designated autonomous region, but you understand that, as there are not many LGBT organizations in the ARMM. Then from Zamboanga and Jolo, none made it to Davao, thanks to force majeure which blocked civilian routes between Jolo and Zamboanga and between Zamboanga and the rest of the land.

Half of the participants didn't even know what brought them there, or that there's such a thing as Bangsamoro Autonomous Political Entity, or FAB, and what's this TransCom. There was a whole bunch of pageant gays from Ladlad Butuan; a smattering from other parts of Mindanao outside the MILF's claimed domain (South Cotabato, Davao and some other virgin territory where LGBT rights consist of being welcomed into Catholic embrace to decorate the vicinity and gay pride lay in having a straight man for a boyfriend, and one from labour union way back, and one representing the religious Muslim sector). But I appreciate the sincerity and the truth of it when a couple of guys said, it's not about us; it does not concern us because we are not part of the autonomous region, it is really up to you there in the ARMM.

Right. Who gives a bleep about territorial wars that burn houses down to ashes and displace a hundred thousand people for as long as it does not happen in one's own backyard or bed.

HR Guy from U.K., whose office hosted the conference, butted in. It's not his problem either, said he, but human rights is for all -- something around that point --. Right. All those wars for your signature online across borders, Uganda, Iran, Cameeron Islands, Russia.

At the days' end, we indeed agreed on a nice one-paragrapher, slightly revised and directly lifted from Article III Section 5 of the Republic Act 6734 or the Organic Act Creating the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao. To wit:

            The Bangsamoro Government shall adopt measures to ensure equality and protection of distinct beliefs and customs among its people in the spirit of unity in diversity and peaceful coexistence: Provided that no person in the Autonomous Region shall, on the basis of creed, religion, ethnic origin, parentage, gender, economic, social or any other status be subjected to discrimination.

Beautiful law. No mention of lesbians, gays, bis, trans please, lest, IHL Expert cautioned, it will only open the floodgates and you get nothing instead of little.

Negotiating for one's rights is like that, you have to make concessions. Maybe in twenty years, you will be able to get the kind of recognition that you want, and the kind of law that you want, but at the moment...

At the moment wait twenty years.

It was very educating, I said to a feminist lesbian friend who did human rights watch across the globe.

A hard lesson in docility.

Yes, she said.