Contemporary Cotabato: The Region and City
The daily Philippine Airlines flight from Manila to Cotabato City wings south over the Sulu Sea to Mindanao, then veers east across the Zamboanga Peninsula and Moro Gulf to approach the Cotabato coast from the west. As the coast and airport come into view the initial peaks of the Tiruray Highlands are visible on the right to the south of the city. This is the territory of the Tiruray, now increasingly denuded by loggers and occupied by Christian settlers. To the left, north of the city across the Pulangi River, are the last reaches of the Bukidnon-Lanao plateau, and the principal mountain stronghold of Cotabato's Muslim separatist insurgents. On the coast below, near the mouth of the river, stands the lone mesa known as Timako Hill, and offshore, the dark crescent of Bongo Island. Looking east and inland, the Cotabato Basin widens and reaches to the horizon. The broad Pulangi River may be seen above its fork at Kabuntalan, stretching as far east as Datu Piang, the old capital of the upriver sultanate.
Directly ahead, Cotabato City extends for about three miles along the southern bank of the north fork of the Pulangi River. As is typical of cities in the southern Philippines, the officially designated perimeter of Cotabato City encloses an area much larger than the city proper. The political boundaries of Cotabato City encompass all of the territory that lies between the forks of the Pulangi, from their common origin at Kabuntalan to liana Bay, an area of about 176 square kilometers. Large areas of land above and below the urban area are semi-flooded and roadless. The city proper is also encircled by water, almost all of it lying within the area circumscribed by the Pulangi, Manday, Matampay, and Esteros Rivers. For most of its history as the downriver capital, water transport was the most reliable means of travel in
and around the city, and the Pulangi River was its main thoroughfare. Today, the Pulangi continues to carry significant traffic, comprised primarily of the Muslim inhabitants of the city. A traveler's account from the early 1960s (a period of relative prosperity for many Muslims in the city) captures the contemporary atmosphere of urban life along the Pulangi: "At Cotobato [sic ] it is life on the water for everyone. There are hundreds of motor-boats, steam vessels, launches, outrigger canoes (some without outboards) and large, ponderous, box-like barges with brightly clothed people sitting on or clinging to every available perch . . . There is a feeling of eighteenth-century Venice, of Canaletto and Guardi, in the intimacies of daily life observed along this waterway . . ." (Kirkup 1967).
A cutoff channel, dug in the early 1960s, begins at the western edge of the city and slices an unnaturally straight route to the sea, facilitating access from Ilana Bay and lessening the occurrence of serious floods in the city caused by the Pulangi overrunning its banks. Cotabato City now relies on roads and bridges for most of its transportation, and a major road bisects the city, running perpendicular to the Pulangi.
Cotabato City remains today the principal commercial center for Cotabato, although the original province has been divided into four separate provinces.[11] That division is directly related to the most significant political and economic development of the modern era—the mass migration of Christian homesteaders from the northern and central Philippines to Cotabato. Magindanao Province (see map 3), which encompasses somewhat more than half of the Cotabato Basin (that closest to the Pulangi River) as well as the northern portion of the Tiruray Highlands, is the only one of the four provinces in which indigenous inhabitants comprise the majority population. [12]
The Cotabato Basin's long-recognized promise as the future "rice granary" of the Philippines appears to be approaching fulfillment. Rice production in the basin has increased steadily since I982,[13] although yields per hectare continue to vary significantly from area to area.[14] Corn and coconuts (the latter yielding the export commodities copra and coconut oil) are the other two principal agricultural products of the basin.
As the primary agricultural service center for the Cotabato Basin, Cotabato City is the site of large hardware, machinery, and chemical supply stores; the head offices of rural banks; rice and corn mills; and copra and rice dealers. As the principal city of southwestern
Map 3.
Three present-day provinces of the Cotabato Basin
Mindanao, Cotabato is also a center for transportation, communications, postsecondary education, and government services.[15] There are no large industrial enterprises in the city, although six fairly large agro-processing firms are located in the near vicinity.[16] For most of its colonial and postcolonial history, Cotabato Town was the poblacion , or capital of the Province of Cotabato. In 1959, the capital town of Cotabato was converted into a chartered city and granted administrative and fiscal autonomy from the province.
Cotabato City has an estimated 1990 population of 127,000 persons, of whom about 48 percent are Muslims (NEDA 1992). It exhibits many of the characteristics of a secondary city of substantial size. The city contains bars, nightclubs, restaurants, and movie theaters. It boasts private schools and colleges, civic groups, radio and television stations, and two weekly newspapers. It accommodates beggars, fugitives, prostitutes, and transvestites; and it is the scene of violent crimes, security guards, and profound disparities in wealth and status. At the same time, Cotabato City retains some features associated with much smaller communities. Important information is communicated broadly and with remarkable swiftness by word of mouth; and the city elite, comprising both Christians and Muslims, tends to be quite well-integrated.
One of the most noted features of Cotabato City is its ethnic diversity.[17] In addition to indigenous Magindanaon and Iranun inhabitants, who comprise about 46 percent of the population, the city is composed of immigrants from other regions of the Philippines, the vast majority of them Christians.[18] Cebuanos and Illongos from the central Philippines together make up about 25 percent of the city's population, and Tagalogs and Ilocanos from Luzon in the northern Philippines comprise another 22 percent. About z percent of the city's population are immigrant Muslims, mostly Maranao from Lake Lanao just to the north. Most of the Chinese residents of the city are also non-Christians. Though they are also immigrants to the region, ethnic Chinese have resided in Cotabato for at least four hundred years, centuries longer than any other immigrant group. In sharp contrast to virtually every other city in Mindanao, in Cotabato City Tagalog (the national language of the Philippines) is the lingua franca.[19] This is likely a result of the ethnic diversity of immigrants but also the fact that many of the earliest Christian immigrants to the city were Tagalog speakers who came as civil servants under Spanish and American colonial administrations. A fairly distinct ethnic division of labor has obtained in the
city for some time, altered only somewhat in the past twenty years. The ethnic Chinese tend to control both retail trade and the processing of agricultural commodities. As evidenced elsewhere in the Philippines and throughout Southeast Asia, the significance of their economic role is far out of proportion to their numbers. Tagalogs have tended to be heavily represented in government service as administrators, clerks, and teachers. Visayan migrants (Cebuano and Ilonggo speakers) are generally found in the professions, in agriculture, and in commercial establishments such as barbershops and drugstores. The Magindanaon and Iranun comprise a large percentage of the fish-sellers, street vendors, and stevedores in the city. Other Muslims are farmers, fishermen, or goldsmiths, and some own and operate inter-island vessels or small rice mills.
By far the most subjectively significant ethnic division in Cotabato City is that between Christians and Muslims—between indigenous Muslim inhabitants and Christian immigrants. The topic of Muslim—Christian relations in Cotabato has been addressed in a number of written works (see, e.g., Hunt 1957; Schlegel 1978; Gowing 1979; Rodil 1986), and Muslim-Christian conflict remains the most typical framework for discussing ethnic politics in Cotabato and all of the Philippine South.[20] I have chosen to approach the politics of group identity in Cotabato from a somewhat different direction—focusing principally on the internal dynamics of Muslim politics in the region. Nevertheless, Muslim politics are inexplicable without some knowledge of the nature of Muslim-Christian relations in Cotabato City.
Cotabato City Christians are possessed of an ethnoreligious chauvinism that stems from their identification with a dominant national culture—that of Christian Filipinos (who comprise more than 90 percent of the population of the Philippines). Voiced attitudes of local Christians toward indigenous Muslims tend to oscillate between paternalism and apprehension, either expressing condescending tolerance for a benighted folk or betraying anxiety about "uncivilized" (and thus unpredictable) neighbors. Ordinary Christians appear to be accepting of, and comfortable with, particular Muslims in direct proportion to the extent to which those Muslims exhibit the cultural markers of Christian Filipinos. Such markers include speaking Tagalog or English, wearing completely Westernized dress, and, in the case of men, drinking alcohol. Although a few Christians vaunt their ability to speak "Muslim" (Magindanaon), the great majority, even those who have lived in Cotabato all their lives, neither speak any indigenous language
nor possess any appreciable knowledge of Muslim customs. This does not seem to be the result of a lack of regular ethnic interaction. Although the local economy is structured in such a way that Christians do not ordinarily employ Muslims, Christians do regularly engage in commercial transactions with Muslims, attend school with them, and, today, work side by side with Muslims in government offices. That local Christians who have studied and worked with Muslims nevertheless express unfamiliarity with their most basic cultural beliefs and practices indicates that Christian ignorance of Muslim customs results from lack of effort rather than insufficient contact.
One illustration of the publicly expressed attitudes of Christians toward Muslims is found in the remarkably persistent pattern of editorial comment in the local newspaper disapproving of Muslim street vendors. During a three-year period from 1985 through 1988—the years covering my first two visits to Cotabato—the Cotabato City newspaper ran regular front-page editorials accompanied by photographs (often on a monthly basis), complaining that Muslim street vendors were a hygienic hazard because they sold fruits or vegetables on the ground and a public nuisance because they blocked walkways. Street vending is engaged in by both Christians and Muslims but is a particularly significant source of income for poor Muslims, many of them women, who sell fruit, vegetables, tobacco, or cigarettes in various parts of the city. Given that pedestrian paths in the city are frequently blocked by a wide variety of commercial and noncommercial activities, and that poor sewage disposal and sanitation have been intractable problems in the Christian-dominated public market, the underlying complaint in these editorials appears to be not that Muslim street vendors are especially unsanitary or obtrusive, but that they appear prominently out of order in Christians' comprehension of the city in which they predominate.
As citizens, albeit mostly reluctant ones, of a predominantly Christian city and state, the Muslims of Cotabato City are generally much more conversant with the cultural beliefs and practices of Christian Filipinos than Christians are with local Muslim culture. Virtually all Muslims under the age of forty speak Tagalog, and a number of younger Muslims, as well as some older men who attended school during the American period, speak English. Local Muslims are regularly exposed to the dominant national culture through popular films, radio, and comic books. Their most protracted exposure to the national culture, however, comes during their education at state-sponsored
1.
Muslim street vendor selling tobacco in Cotabato City.The great
majority of Muslim street vendors are women, many of them older
women, who support their families selling fruits and vegetables,
betel, tobacco,and other items on the street corners of the city.
schools.[21] The great majority of Muslim children in the city attend state schools for a minimum of six years, most continue for an additional four years, and a fair number carry on for a further four years of postsecondary education. Most young Muslims have Christian school acquaintances, and a few have Christian friends. Muslim-Christian marriages, most commonly between Muslim men and Christian women, are not at all uncommon in the city. Many younger Muslims also tend to join, at least indirectly, in the celebration of Christian holidays such as Christmas, New Year's Eve, and Saint Valentine's Day.
Cotabato City possesses a reputation, justified by the available evidence, for maintaining harmonious Muslim-Christian relations. Residents point out that, even during periods of violent conflict between Muslims and Christians in the region, armed sectarian clashes were virtually absent in the city. For most of the past thirty years Christians have supported Muslim politicians for city offices and Muslims have voted for Christian candidates. At the same time, Muslims are aware that Christians have been better able to advance their own interests in the city because of their greatly superior economic and political power. Finally, we sharpen our focus to examine a particular urban Muslim community—Campo Muslim.