Gov’t mulls role in Sabah case

Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra on Sunday said the Philippine government is still studying its position on the $15 billion award granted to the heirs of the Sultanate of Sulu by a French arbitral court.

“We’ve begun collating reference materials for our study,” Guevarra said. “But this task will require a lot of manhours to complete.”

Guevarra said they have to determine the role of the state in the enforcement of the ruling.

“Our immediate concern is on whether or not the Philippine government has any role to play in relation to the French arbitral award in favor of the heirs of the Sultanate of Sulu which, on its face, pertains to a private cause of action,” he said.

The court ruled in favor of eight claimants, which it acknowledged as the legitimate descendants of Jamalul Kiram II, the last Sultan of Sulu who died in 1936.

The arbitrator agreed with the claimants’ interpretation of the sultanate’s 1878 deed with the British North Borneo Chartered Company as an agreement leasing Sabah, rather than ceding or selling off the territory as the Malaysian government argued.

Malaysia, which had inherited the role of the British company as the administrator of Sabah, reneged on the deal by halting its annual payment of 5,300 Malaysian ringgit (over P65,000) to the sultan’s heirs in 2013, the court said.

Payment for the heirs was stopped by Malaysia after a bloody incursion that year by followers of the late Jamalul Kiram III, who took on the title of Sultan of Sulu.

The ruling though was not recognized by the Malaysian government.

In July, they were granted a stay by the Paris Court of Appeal from implementing the arbitral court’s order.

Last week, Guevarra formed a task force within the Office of the Solicitor General to study any wider implications of the arbitral award.

The task force began digging into the voluminous historical documents it has to examine.

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