AFP ensures contingency measures in place in Mindanao

MANILA, Philippines – The military gave assurances yesterday that contingency measures are in place in case hostilities in Mindanao escalate following the Supreme Court’s ruling declaring the Bangsamoro homeland deal with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) as unconstitutional.

Army chief Lt. Gen. Victor Ibrado said the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) has already considered the possibility of a renewed outbreak of fighting and security arrangements are already in place in some parts of Central Mindanao.

Ibrado however clarified they have yet to receive orders from the AFP top brass to increase the security alert in the region following the SC ruling.

He also said they have not been ordered to augment their forces in provinces affected by the fighting.

“We still have, we still can afford to move in troops if necessary but at this moment we don’t see that we need to do that,” Ibrado said.

MILF chief negotiator Mohagher Iqbal, on the other hand, said an escalation of hostilities is likely because of the SC ruling.

Iqbal said the SC ruling has only spurred restive elements of the MILF to stage attacks.

Iqbal said the MILF leadership would still do its best to restrain its fighters from committing atrocities, knowing the negotiations are still the best way to resolve the conflict in Mindanao.

“But we will still do, we will restrain them because we believe the best way to solve the problem is still through negotiation,” he said.

This developed as MILF rebels shot dead a farmer during a raid on a village in North Cotabato yesterday.

Initial reports said Salvador Rigodo, a farmer of Sitio Balogo in Pigkawayan, North Cotabato, was shot dead by the rebels who were on their way to attack a militia outpost in the village.

Seven MILF rebels were killed during the encounter with responding policemen and government troops, the military said.

Iqbal added the SC ruling has given more reason for restive MILF members to take the initiative against the government.

Hostilities erupted when the SC on July had stopped the signing of the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD), the preliminary peace agreement that would have allowed the MILF self-rule over an expanded autonomous region in Central Mindanao.

Renegade MILF commanders Ameril Umbra Kato and Abdurahman Macapaar, alias Kumander Bravo, took the initiative by attacking several towns and villages in Central Mindanao that killed scores of people and left thousands wounded and displaced.

The MILF blamed the hostilities on the SC decision shelving the MOA-AD.

Iqbal said they would still insist on the validity of the MOA-AD, pointing out the government’s responsibility to comply with the agreement.

“We will still hold the government accountable because the government is the party to the negotiation and we have initialed it so we will insist,” he said.

Iqbal said that for the peace talks to resume, the MOA-AD would have to be implemented.

Iqbal insisted that the MILF would not even agree to have the MOA-AD renegotiated.

Malacañang, on the other hand, maintained that peace negotiations would only resume if renegade MILF groups led by Kato and Bravo would spare civilians from further attack.

The military said yesterday’s attackers in North Cotabato were part of Kato’s group.

The government has put up a P10-million reward for Kato and Bravo who led their forces in a rampage in Central Mindanao last July that killed scores of people and left thousands wounded and displaced.

The military said some 200 rebels came from Balogo River on a dozen pump boats from Kabuntalan, Shariff Kabunsuan in the early morning and looted several houses in the area.

Responding policemen and government troops immediately engaged the rebels in a 30-minute gun battle to prevent the attackers from controlling the busy Cotabato-Davao Highway.

More than a hundred families in Sitio Balogo were forced to evacuate to safer areas for fear of getting trapped in the crossfire.

Col. Julieto Ando, spokesman for the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said villagers identified some of the rebels as those who took part in last July’s bloody rampage.

Ando said the rebels attacked Sitio Balogo by strafing the houses of villagers with automatic gunfire while another group was raiding their livestock.

– John Unson, Jaime Laude