TY  - BOOK
AU  - Abat, Fortunato U.,
TI  - The Day we nearly lost Mindanao :	: the CEMCOM story (how CEMCOM checked the secessionist attempt to establish a de facto Bangsa Moro Republic in Cotabato) /	
AV  - DS 688.M2 
PY  - 1999///
CY  - Quezon City : 
PB  - Fortunato U. Abat
KW  - Muslims -- Political activity -- Philippines
KW  - Mindanao Island (Philippines) -- History -- Autonomy and independence movements
KW  - Mindanao Island (Philippines) -- Politics and government
N1  - Includes annex and index; Includes bibliographical references
N2  - EFFORTS AT MUSLIM-CHRISTIAN RECONCILIATION

As history tells us, the Bangsa Moro problem did not develop merely as a problem of the Muslims, it is a problem that has been rooted from a legacy handed down by Catholic Spain to the Spanish colonizers and Christian Filipinos who failed to recognize the integrity and worth of Muslim Filipinos

Dr. Jose Rizal, seeing the divisiveness of this legacy in the building of the Filipino nation, proposed in the statutes of the La Liga Filipina to unite the entire archipelago into one homogenous body to include the Muslims in the South.

Emilio Aguinaldo, on the other hand sought the establishment of a special political system that would recognize and respect the beliefs and traditions of the Muslims and other non-Christian communities. Unfortunately, the delegates. to the Malolos Congress who were nurtured by Spanish heritage could not appreciate Aguinaldo's call for fraternity with the Muslims and accept them in one nation.

Thus through the years, Muslim dissatisfaction with the central government in Manila persisted. And in 1973, the most serious threat to our territorial integrity broke out in Cotabato. The MNLF attempted to wrest power by military means and establish a Bangsa Moro Republic. Government response was a decisive military counteraction by the Central Mindanao Command (CEMCOM) that averted the secessionist objective and insured the integrity of Mindanao as part of the national territory.

Unpartitioned Cotabato at that time was a huge province for the govemment forces then stationed there to secure and defend from the blitz-like onslaught of the secessionist rebels. It was the largest of the nineteen (19) provinces of mainland Mindanao and the Sulu archipelago comprising one-sixth (1/6) of the total land area of almost 102,000 square kilometers. When the rebellion spilled over to the other provinces of Central Mindanap CEMCOM's area of responsibility was expanded
ER  -