Maradeka

Maradeka

Flag of Maradeka
Motto	Onward Bangsamoro Struggle for Freedom
Formation	2000
Type	Political organization, Alliance
Purpose	Islamic democracy Bangsamoro Right to Self-Determination
Headquarters	Manila
Location	Mindanao, Philippines
Region served	Bangsamoro
Secretary General	Datu Nash Pangadapun
Main organ	The Majlis and The Permanent Secretariat

Maradeka is an emerging pro-democracy Muslim political organization espousing non-violent political action in the Philippines amidst the backdrop of over four decades of armed Muslim insurgency mounted by Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in their Moro Quest for self-rule after people dissenting Philippine government treatment of Muslim minority as second class citizens and suffering years of social, economic, and political inequities called Mindanao problem

Maradeka is rooted from Malay word merdeka etymologically means freedom or liberation In reinvigorating the spirit and inherent values of freedom from Malay forebears, the word Maradeka was adopted as the name of the umbrella freedom alliance of 72 Bangsamoro civil society and political organizations, groups such as Task Force Mindanao, Alternative Muslim Mindanao Entrepreneurial Dev't, Inc (AMMENDI), Basilan Solidarity, Organization of Maguindanaon and Iranon, Bangsamoro Consultative Assembly, Bangsamoro Supreme Council of Ulama (BSCU), Maradeka Youth, Bangsa Iranun Muslim Advocates for Peace, Inc., Ittihadun As-Shabab Al-Muslimeen, Karitan Foundation Inc., Mindanao Peace Observers, Manila Peace Zone Community Association (MAPZCA), and Mindanao War Victims.

Maradeka, a Philippine civil society network and alliance of Moro organizations, pursues its social and political advocacy and development programs with its partners organizations and institutions. It build its organization's strength in grass-root community and citizens' action and consensus building through its regional people assemblies (RPA) held in various regions widely in Mindanao and Sulu, and growing in the Central Luzon and Calabarzon area. Maradeka as ideological organization takes its main form of action in articulating voices of marginalized Moro people, democratic dialogues, participatory community consultations (shura), social and political advocacy campaigns, and launches mass actions to demonstrate its protests, appeal, and demands on various legitimate issues to influence policies affecting the Muslim people.

The Muslims in the Southern Philippines known as Moro or Bangsamoro claimed to have preceded the Philippine Commonwealth when the United States Government granted in 1935 self-rule due to the demand for independence by Filipino politicians headed by Manuel L. Quezon. The Bangsamoro people have established their independent Sultanates, namely the Sultanate of Sulu, Sultanate of Maguindanao and the Pat A Pangampong of Ranaw (Federal States of Ranaw). These Moro Sultanates mounted a colonial resistance called Spanish–Moro Wars by Dr. Casar Adib Majul in his book History of the Muslims in the Philippines, against the incursion of Spanish Colonial power in 1571 and the annexation of the Mindanao, Sulu, and Palawan islands by the United States of America in the Moro–American War (1899–1913) after the Spanish–American War (1899–1902). The Moros fought against the Japanese invasion in World War II.