Analyzing the Philippine-Moro conflict: Malaysia in the Moro National Liberation Front's discourse

The Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) led by Nur Misuari is a Muslim insurgent group that has been against the Philippine state since 1972. The group's aim was to achieve independence from the Philippines and establish a Moro state called the Bangsamoro Republik. In the early days of its struggle, the MNLF and Malaysia had close ties. The Malaysian government supported the MNLF against the Philippines state by providing weapons and funds. Meanwhile, the MNLF referred to the Malaysians as the ethnic and religious kin of the Moros. However, the relationship between the MNLF and Malaysia changed. After 2001, the MNLF began criticizing the Malaysian government and its policies. Besides condemning the new Malaysian government, it was also criticizing the previous Malaysian leaders who had supported the group. It accused the Malaysians of conspiring with the Philippine state in colonizing the Moro homeland and oppressing the Moro people. Moreover, the group questioned the Malaysian role as the peace mediator between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which is the rival of the MNLF. For the MNLF, the Malaysian government's involvement in the new peace negotiation was an act to hide its real intention of perpetuating its colonial designs. In understanding this shift in the discourse of the MNLF, this thesis adopts the poststructuralist theory. According to this theory, state and non-state actors are involved in a battle of discourse, wherein they try to justify their identity and existence. In this struggle to preserve their identities and consolidate their authority over their purported subjects, the state, and the non-state actors practice Foreign Policy. Through Foreign Policy, the state and other groups found within the boundary of the state incorporate in their discourse external actors like foreign states to legitimize their identity and to normalize their exclusion of their primary enemies which threaten their identities and existence. In this case, this study argues that the change in the power relations within the Philippines after 2001 had threatened the position of the MNLF as the sole representative of the Moros. For this reason, the group is trying to re-establish its legitimacy by incorporating Malaysia in its discourse. In other words, the group uses Malaysia as its reference point from which it reconstructs its identity as the legitimate representative of the Moro people and delegitimizes its opponents – the Philippine state and the MILF.