A case of history repeating itself

The ownership of Sabah had always been a “we say, they say” issue.

The way I remember it from political science class, it originally belonged to some Malaysian royalty. It was passed on to a sultan from Mindanao as a reward for aiding the Malaysian royalty during a war.

The sultan’s family then leased it for a hundred years to a British company that later sold it to Malaysia.

In 1963, after being under British control for a long time, the Federation of Malaysia claimed Sabah. Of course, the Philippines protested and there was tension for quite some time between the two neighboring countries. The threat of war was real, so I was told.

When the Miss Asia Quest was revived by the Filipino franchise-holders in 1968, Malaysia sent a delegate. She placed fourth and seemed happy with her third runner-up finish. Had she not brought home anything beauty pageant watchers speculated that Malaysia could have finally declared war against us. I doubt if they were serious.

However, the Filipinos were truly hopeful we could get Sabah back. Proof of this is that map of the Philippines in Luneta. I haven’t been to Rizal Park in decades and I have no idea if that map is still there, but I recall that in one corner there was — in concrete — what was supposed to be Sabah.

Now history depends on who’s writing it. When I recently looked up Sabah, its history now seems to be told from another point of view. I am not going to contest that anymore because that may even spark a war between the two nations and I don’t want to be blamed for it. And as far as I know, we’ve given up our claim to this piece of territory.

I’m bringing up Sabah’s history because I watched the indie movie Rekrut. I had no idea what it was all about and I only found out that the story is culled from actual events that transpired in 1967.

Directed by Danilo Gomez Añonuevo, Rekrut opens with a group of young men (Joem Bascon, JM de Guzman, Dominic Roco, Alwyn Uytingco, Manuel Chua, etc.) on their way to an intensive military training (they were supposed to attack Sabah, but didn’t know that in the beginning). In the end, they — except for one who survived to tell the story — became the victims of the Jabidah massacre.

I had to tell you the ending already because the Jabidah massacre is already part of Philippine history. I will not, for instance, withhold the information from you that Jose Rizal was shot in Bagumbayan if that had been yet another film about our national hero.

The late Anthony Alonzo also had a Jabidah Massacre movie filmed opposite Dinah Dominguez in the past. Too bad, I didn’t get to see that one.

But Rekrut proves to be relevant — and even very timely — now as you read this. Even then, there was already a problem with the military. Oh yes, there was already corruption even then. The soldiers, for example, were practically starved and didn’t get their pay and yet their officers (Emilio Garcia, among them) could hire prostitutes shipped into the island.

And now, the issue of corruption in the military had been hounding headlines for weeks — with the unfortunate death of Secretary Angelo Reyes as the biggest shocker to the public. I never had the chance to meet the man, but I have yet to recover from the initial shock when told about the way he went. I’m still deeply affected. That shouldn’t have happened.

Prior to this ongoing Senate investigation regarding military corruption, the planned sale of Camps Crame and Aguinaldo also became big news. I was going to write about it to oppose the sale (I’m a taxpayer and I have my say), except that this plan is definitely no longer pushing through.

Selling the two military camps would have been a bad idea. I conform to what the majority of those who opposed the sale said: We don’t know where the proceeds will go. And it’s true that we have yet to determine what happened to the money earned from the sale of Fort Bonifacio.

Should we make efforts to reclaim Sabah? No. Not yet. Not when the system in this country is still so stinking rotten. Not until we have people we can trust in the government. Hopefully, we get there. But we’re not there yet.

This may sound unpatriotic, but resource-rich Sabah seems to be in better hands at the moment.