100 MILF fighters to attend signing of peace roadmap

By TJ Burgonio

MANILA, Philippines – After waging a decades-long fight for a separate Islamic state, over 100 members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front will troop to Malacañang on Monday to witness the signing of an agreement or framework on how to settle the 40-year-old conflict, officials said Friday.

Ahead of the signing of the roadmap to a final peace agreement, one of President Benigno Aquino III’s spokespersons on Friday aired an appeal to critics: “Give peace a chance.”

Chief government negotiator Marvic Leonen and his MILF counterpart, Mohagher Iqbal, will sign the agreement on Monday afternoon before President Aquino, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, and Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, secretary general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

The biggest delegation to witness the signing of the preliminary deal would come from the ranks of the 12,000-strong MILF, which broke away from the Moro National Liberation Front after the signing of the 1996 Tripoli peace agreement, and carried on the armed struggle, officials said.

“There will be major delegations from their different areas of constituency,” Teresita Deles, presidential adviser on the peace process, said by phone.

MILF chairman Murad Ebrahim will lead the MILF delegation that an official put at more than 100. It will be the first time the MILF hierarchy will set foot in Malacañang since the Moro insurgency began in 1972.

Members of the international contact group and international monitoring team, as well as civil society groups that advocated peace over the years are also expected to witness the signing of the agreement, officials said.

The agreement— a blueprint for the setting up an autonomous Moro homeland called Bangsamoro — has been hailed by the United Nations, the United States, Australia and other countries as a “historic leap” to ending decades-long armed conflict in Mindanao.

Some criticism came from Moro leader Nur Misuari, former MNLF chairman, who called the agreement illegal in view of the 1996 Tripoli agreement, and threatened to challenge it before international courts.

Since Misuari’s statements threatened to throw a monkey wrench into the deal, Abigail Valte, one of President Aquino’s spokespersons, said: “We would like to reiterate the appeal of our peace panel: “Let’s give peace a chance.”

She said it would be prudent for everyone to take a look at the framework agreement, and the annexes on power-sharing and wealth-sharing that both panels would craft.

“Let’s take a look at these, and give them a chance to work,” she said at a Palace news briefing.

Deles said the government would not be distracted by such statements from sealing a peace agreement by the end of the year.

“We remain focused on the work at hand. Whatever happens, we have a job to do. We’re committed and focused to make sure this will bring us to the light at the end of the tunnel,” she said, saying she respected Misuari’s views.

“We continue to hope that Misuari will come to support the process,” she added.

After the signing, the President is expected to issue an executive order creating the Transition Commission that would draft the Bangsamoro Basic Law, among others, and both panels would buckle down to work to finalize the annexes, Deles said.

“The draft has been done before the framework agreement. Hopefully, that will be issued before the end of October,” she said of the EO. “The EO will start the process.”

After the signing, technical working groups would resume discussions on the annexes that would be crucial in fleshing out the salient points of the future final agreement, while another committee would tackle the provisions on normalization.

Deles said the framework agreement was a “major work” in realizing the final agreement and that any difficulties that could be encountered in the drafting of the annexes “could be resolved at any stage of the process.”

“It’s a very major roadmap. It tells us where we will go,” she said. “There are still difficult issues [in the annexes] but when you have a roadmap, there are stages where some of the issues can be resolved.”

She expressed gratitude to the OIC for supporting the agreement.

“OIC has been our partner in the peace process. We know that our Bangsamoro constituency is part of community being attended to by the OIC. They have helped us in the early stages of the peace process,” she said.

Ghadzali Jaafar, MILF vice chairman for political affairs, confirmed that more than 100 MILF leaders would attend the signing of the agreement.

“This happens once in a lifetime of every leader. They want to show to the world that they’re very appreciative of all those who very seriously and sincerely worked for the resolution of the Bangsamoro issue, of course led by the President, the peace panel, ICG (International Contact Group), IMT (International Monitoring Team), and leaders of non-government organizations,” Jaafar said by phone.

“This is a breakthrough. It’s a milestone and very historical,” he added.

He confirmed it would be their first time “to set foot in Malacañang since Malacañang was built.”

In the face of some criticism, Jaafar said that the agreement was not “exclusive to MILF but inclusive to every individual Bangsamoro.”

“That includes Nur Misuari and all leaders of the MNLF, and all other leaders of the Bangsamoro,” he said.

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