‘An anthology on the Philippine claim to North Borneo’ (1)
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW
Toward the end of the 16th century, the southern part of the Philippine archipelago was ruled by sultanates. At that time, the dominant sultanates in the area were those of Sulu and of Maguindanao.
The political landscape changed when Spain became the colonial ruler of the Philippine archipelago.
Spanish colonial authority over the Philippine islands began in 1521 when the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan set foot in the archipelago and claimed it for the King of Spain.
Then there is North Borneo, the territory in South East Asia now called Sabah by Malaysia.
North Borneo is located at the northeastern tip of the large island of Borneo, south of Palawan and west of Sulu, and approximately 500 kilometers from western Mindanao. It is a land rich in natural resources.
In 1640, Spain entered into a treaty with the Sultan of Sulu and the Sultan of Maguindanao, by which Madrid recognized the independence of the two sultanates. Spain acknowledged the Sultan of Sulu as the sovereign ruler of North Borneo.
When a rebellion broke out in the neighboring Sultanate of Brunei in 1665, Muaddin, the Sultan of Brunei, faced a serious threat to his throne. Thus put, Muaddin requested military assistance from his cousin, the Sultan of Sulu, to put down the rebellion. The Sultan of Sulu obliged.
In 1675, the rebellion was finally quelled, and Sultan Muaddin ceded North Borneo to the Sultan of Sulu in grateful appreciation for the military help given to him by his cousin. North Borneo, therefore, became the property of the Sultanate of Sulu.
Spanish sovereignty did not extend to North Borneo because it was acquired by the Sultanate of Sulu from the Sultanate of Brunei. By the start of the nineteenth century, North Borneo remained the property of the Sultan of Sulu.
In the middle of the nineteenth century, however, Spain attempted to take full control of the properties of the Sultan of Sulu. Eventually, the Sultan of Sulu ceded Palawan and Sulu to Spain.
North Borneo was not covered by the cession of Palawan and Sulu to Spain. Accordingly, North Borneo remained the property of the Sultan of Sulu despite the cession of Palawan and Sulu to Spain.
A problem of immense proportion involving North Borneo will emerge in the latter part of the nineteenth century when a British company took interest in the area.
THE LEASE OF NORTH BORNEO
In 1878, the Sultan of Sulu, Barradudin Kiram, executed a deed of pajak over North Borneo in favor of a British company which came to be known as the British North Borneo Company. The company was represented in the lease contract by an Austrian, Gustavus Baron de Overbeck, and by an Englishman, Alfred Dent.
Written in Arabic, the dead of pajak stipulated an annual rental for North Borneo, to be paid by the British North Borneo Company to the Sultanate of Sulu.
During the years that followed, the annual rent stipulated in the deed of pajak was duly and religiously paid by the lessee to the Sultan of Sulu.
THE MADRID PROTOCOL
In 1885, the United Kingdom, Germany and Spain executed the so-called MADRID PROTOCOL which ascertained the extent of Spanish sovereignty in South East Asia. In the MADRID PROTOCOL, Spain relinquished any claim over North Borneo. That explicit relinquishment is important because it settled suppositions from certain sectors that in 1878, the Sultan of Sulu ceded North Borneo to Spain.
It has been argued that Spain had no valid claim over North Borneo to begin with, because it never acquired sovereignty over North Borneo in the first place. This argument is strengthened by the MADRID PROTOCOL.
THE TREATY OF PARIS
In 1898, war broke out between Spain and the United States of America. From the onset, the Americans were certain to be victorious. Before the year was over, Spain was ready to concede defeat.
To formally end the war, Madrid and Washington, D.C. signed the
TREATY OF PARIS on 10 December 1898. Under the TREATY OF PARIS, Spain ceded all its territories in the Caribbean and the Pacific, i.e., Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippine Islands, to the United States for Twenty Million United States Dollars (US$20,000,000). In terms of population, that meant an expenditure of less than two American dollars for every native inhabitant of the archipelago.
Since Spain never exercised dominion over North Borneo, or had already relinquished, by way of the MADRID
PROTOCOL, any claim it may have over the said territory, then North Borneo was and remained the property of the Sultan of Sulu for the duration of the Spanish colonial government over the Philippine Islands.
That also means North Borneo is not among the territories ceded by Spain to the United States recited in the TREATY OF PARIS.
THE BATES TREATY
After acquiring the Philippine Islands from Spain by way of the TREATY OF PARIS, the United States negotiated an agreement with the Sultanate of Sulu regarding American sovereignty in the Philippine Islands and the status of North Borneo. An earlier agreement called THE BATES TREATY proved to be unsatisfactory. This led to further negotiations.
Meanwhile, in 1906, the United States sent a formal reminder to the United Kingdom that North Borneo belongs to the Sultanate of Sulu. For reasons unexplained, the United Kingdom did not act of the said advisory.
THE CARPENTER AGREEMENT
Finally, in March 1915, THE BATES TREATY was replaced by the so-called CARPENTER AGREEMENT which was signed by Frank Carpenter, who then headed the Department of Mindanao and Sulu (under the American colonial administration in the Philippine Islands), and by the Sultan of Sulu.
Under the CARPENTER AGREEMENT, the Sultanate of Sulu recognized American sovereignty in the Philippine Islands, to the exclusion of North Borneo which the United States recognized as the property of the Sultanate of Sulu. North Borneo by then was under lease to the British North Borneo Company.
Five years later, in 1920, the United States again sent a formal reminder to the United Kingdom that North Borneo belongs to the Sultanate of Sulu. Like before, the United Kingdom did not act on that advisory.
To be continued