Postwar era[edit]

Under pressure to resolve agrarian unrest in various parts of the country and noting that Mindanao
was rich in mineral resources and weather favorable to agriculture, later Philippine presidents
continued the promotion of migration which the American colonial government began in 1903.
Massive arrivals of non-Muslim migrants happened particularly during the Commonwealth period
under President Manuel Quezon and later under right-wing presidents Ramon
Magsaysay and Ferdinand Marcos.[24] As a result, the proportion of indigenous peoples in Mindanao
to shrink from majority in 1913 to minority by 1976.[24] The best lands in Mindanao were given to
settlers and owners of corporate agriculture, while most development investments and government
services were offered to the Christian population. This caused the Muslim population to be backward
and rank among the poorest in their own country.[25] The resettlement programme was not entirely
peaceful as some settlers managed to obtain land from the native Muslims through harassment and
other violent efforts which drove the Muslims out of their own lands. [26]

The Muslims felt alienated by the Philippine government and felt threatened by the migrants'
economic and political domination in their own homeland, the same way the Lumads were displaced
centuries ago when Islam arrived in the Philippines. Some Muslim groups turned to extortion and
violence to protect their land and avoid being displaced. These activities prevented the Muslims from
easily integrating with the rest of the country.[27]

The Philippine government did not immediately recognize Islamic laws which resulted in the system
of education and the socioeconomic development of the Muslims. Children studying in public
schools were forced to learn about Christianity while the Bangsamoros struggled with their economy,
land, and ownership, and the persistence of hostile and unjust actions compared to the Christian
communities in Mindanao.[22]

As an effect of the resettlement, traditional Muslim leaders (also referred as datu) were also voted
out during the polls as Christians, who made up a significant majority of the voters, preferred the
Christian politicians over them. These local datus suffered a loss in prestige as they could no longer
control the Muslim lands.[28] These politicians lost much of the capabilities they had possessed
initially to manage the Muslim populace.[29]

Moro conflict[edit]
Main article: Moro conflict
In March 1968, fishermen in Manila Bay rescued a Muslim man named Jibin Arula from the waters.
They discovered that he had suffered from gunshot wounds, and he later recounted that he was the
lone survivor of what would later be termed the "Jabidah Massacre."[26][30]

According to Jibin Arula's account, the Marcos administration had gathered a group
of Tausūg recruits for an operation called "Project Merdeka" (merdeka being the Malay "freedom").
The military began training them on the island of Corregidor to form a secret commando unit
called Jabidah, which would destabilize and take over Sabah.[31] The trainees eventually rejected
their mission, for reasons that are still debated by historians today. Jibin Arula said that whatever the
reasons behind their objections, all of the recruits aside from him were killed, and he escaped only
by pretending to be dead.[30] Marcos loyalist Juan Ponce Enrile, who served as Justice
Secretary and Defense Minister during the Marcos administration, claimed this was a hoax, which
was reputed as fake news and an attempt "absolve him (Enrile) of his crimes as the architect of
martial law".[32][33][34]

Then Lanao del Sur congressman Rashid Lucman called for Congress to begin proceedings
to impeach President Marcos after the exposé implied that Marcos was ultimately responsible for the
massacre.[35] When his proposal didn't get enough congressional support, he became convinced that
Muslims should rule themselves in Muslim Mindanao - a conviction which led him to eventually
establish the Bangsamoro Liberation Organization (BMLO),[36] which later joined forces with the Moro
National Liberation Front (MNLF).[35]

Cotabato governor Datu Udtog Matalam [37] saw the anger of the Muslim people of Mindanao and
established the Muslim Independence Movement (MIM), which openly called for the secession of the
region to create a Muslim state.[38] The MIM did not last long because Datu Udtog Matalam
negotiated with Marcos and accepted a post in his cabinet, but many of its members broke away and
became the main force of the MNLF.[39]

On September 23, 1972, Ferdinand Marcos announced that he had placed the entirety of the
Philippines, including Muslim Mindanao, under martial law. While Datu Udtog Matalam's MIM was
already defunct, one of its former members, Nur Misuari, established the MNLF a month after the
declaration of Martial Law, on October 21, 1972.[39]

Proclamation 1081 dissolved the various political groups that had been previously established in the
Moro provinces, and with the MIM having already been dissolved, Marcos' declaration of martial law
effectively assured the MNLF, which was more radical than its predecessors, would come to
dominate the Moro separatist movement.[40]