Middle Eastern Educations and the Formation of an Islamic Counterelite

Before tracing further the path of Nur Misuari and his fellow Manilabased intellectuals toward Muslim separatism, the genesis of a second group of Philippine Muslim intellectuals needs exploring.

Between 1955 and 1978 the government of Egypt, as part of the pan-Islamic programs of Gamel Abdul Nasser, granted more than two hundred scholarships to young Philippine Muslims, the great majority of whom studied at al-Azhar University in Cairo (Mastura 1984; Majul 1979; George 1980). In the previous few years, some graduates of al-Azhar (mostly Indonesians) had been sent to teach in the Muslim Philippines, but it was only with Nasser's ascent to power in 1954 that significant numbers of Philippine Muslim students were able to undertake advanced studies at Islamic institutions in the Middle East.^[5] A number of those students were scions of datu families, but many others

were not, and the scholarships thus became another avenue for ordinary Muslim students to gain higher educations. Al-Azhar graduates returned to the Philippines after overseas stays averaging eight years, and most became religious teachers in their home provinces. While far fewer Philippine Muslims studied in Cairo than in Manila, the influence of Islamic graduates was out of proportion to their numbers. That influence initially took a political-symbolic form as al-Azhar graduates became involved in the leadership of the separatist movement. It was much later before the presence of indigenous Islamic teachers had a commensurate effect on popular Islamic consciousness in the Philippines. As in Manila, the Philippine Muslim student community in Cairo became a center for the development of activism in pursuit of social and political change in the Muslim Philippines, but, unlike that in Manila, student activism among Philippine Muslims in Cairo was explicitly and exclusively Islamic in character.^[6]

One of the most politically inclined of the Cairo students was Hashim Salamat, a Magindanaon from Cotabato. Salamat, who left for Cairo in 1959, was related to Congressman Pendatun but his family was neither wealthy nor prominent. Salamat was a member of the fourth cohort of Cotabato Muslims to receive scholarships to al-Azhar. He returned to Cotabato in 1967 and obtained a position as provincial librarian. However, his real interest, as he stated in a 1977 interview, was to work to reform Muslim political and religious affairs in the province at least partly by participating in politics. Salamat and his al-Azhar cohort were frustrated in their attempts at political participation because, as he said, "the old Muslim traditional and political leaders wouldn't even allow us to get near them" (quoted in Mindanao Cross , February 12, 1977). Salamat eventually became associated with established Muslim politicians and, more consequentially, with Nur Misuari through a most unlikely intermediary, Datu Udtug Matalam, the recently retired governor of Cotabato and renowned champion of Muslim-Christian cooperation.^[7]