Introduction
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and conflicts are among the top causes of armed clashes in Mindanao (Torres, 2007; Tolibas-NuĂąez, 1997; Muslim, 1994). These are also the topmost causes of rido (i.e., inter-family or inter-clan vendetta conflicts) in Basilan, North Cotabato, Sulu, and the three Zamboanga provinces in Mindanao (Kamlian, 2007). In Lanao del Sur, these problems are said to be second to politics as reason for rido (Matuan, 2007). In North Cotabato and Bukidnon, these same problems are the fourth cause of armed conflicts (Alim et al, 2007). In general, land conflicts are land tenure disputes over ownership or who owns the land.
or governance within their own ancestral domains. This is crucial because it questions the very foundations both of the republic’s landholding system and the basis for governance.
But this is only one dimension of the problem. The other dimensions are ethnic and political which have risen to prominence in recent years; all three are sometimes so closely intermeshed that it has become extremely difficult to see one without the other two. Solutions, too, must be viewed in this broad perspective. Ethnic because a land dispute, fairly recent in origin, inevitably involves a clash of cultures and systems, usually modern (read: government) laws versus customary laws on land ownership and disposition. Political because the Moro and the Lumad, marginalized or displaced by massive governmentsponsored migration and resettlement from the north in the 20th century and finding themselves having nowhere else to go, have launched their respective struggles for self-determination
The Present Study Designed as an initiative to see through this mesh and start a process of finding solutions to the voluminous cases of land ownership disputes, this study was undertaken in two parts. The first part is a survey of land laws that have affected Moro lands since before the coming of Spanish and American colonizers. The second part is focused on five cases of land tenure problems in the provinces of Cotabato, Maguindanao and Sultan Kudarat.
Therefore, it is not just a fight between two claimants within the Torrens system of land ownership; it is also a clash between two concepts, the Regalian Doctrine, and native title. For the Moro, claiming that they possess the fundamental right to determine their final political status, resolution of the problem requires a sovereignty-based settlement between the Moro nation and the Republic of the Philippines.
The five cases of land tenure disputes are: (a) between Moros and Christian Settlers in Impao, Isulan, Sultan Kudarat ; (b) between Moro ancestral land’s claimants and a Christian settler in Barangay Rangeban, Midsayap, Cotabato; (c) between a Chris1
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