DOJ starts building case vs Misuari followers

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Justice (DOJ) has started a fact-finding inquiry to determine the charges to be filed against Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) gunmen who attacked Zamboanga City.

In Department Order 636, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima designated assistant state prosecutors Niven Canlapan and Aristotle Reyes, prosecution lawyer Cesar Angelo Chavez III, assistant regional prosecutor Ivy Damayo-Elvinas and assistant city prosecutor Edwinlino Custodio as members of the panel.

The team would be involved in the “case buildup, determination of proper charges to be filed, if any, and evaluation of evidence prior to the filing of appropriate cases, if any, against those who may be found liable for the incident.”

They will be working hand-in-hand with the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group of the Philippine National Police.

“Among the crimes being studied is rebellion. The function of the team is to make sure the proper charges are based on facts and evidence because it would be hard to file rebellion or sedition, for example, without supporting facts and evidence,” De Lima said.

Some 13,000 people have reportedly been displaced since Monday, when about 180 MNLF gunmen barged into six coastal neighborhoods, triggering firefights with soldiers and police.

The rebels also used about 200 residents as “human shields.”

Misuari should be held accountable

Meanwhile, the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) peace panels condemned the attack, adding that MNLF founding chairman Nur Misuari and other MNLF leaders should be held accountable.

“The perpetrators must be stopped and held accountable for their acts,” the two panels said in a joint statement.

“Those behind the continued acts of violence in Mindanao do not want the current peace process between the government and the MILF to succeed. Their actions intend to derail the process using violence and disinformation to spread fear and chaos in Mindanao,” the statement added.

Government peace panel chair Miriam Coronel-Ferrer said certain groups and leaders are “waiting for the process to fail.”

“Waiting in the wings to be able to say: See, nothing has come out of that process. We told you so. Come and join us,” she said.

But she said the government and the MILF could not afford to allow the peace process to fail.

“We have to show to one and all that through reason and compassion, through dialogue and cooperation, we can create the process and the institutions that will enable one and all, exercising their free will but refraining from the use of all forms of violence, to rebuild their societies and polities,” Ferrer said.

Tripartite meeting

Amid continued skirmishes between government troops and MNLF gunmen, a tripartite meeting among the government, MNLF and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is set to convene in Yogyakarta, Indonesia next week to review the implementation of the 1996 peace agreement with the MNLF.

“Among the outcomes of the review process are common understandings on the matter of strategic minerals and 42 consensus points that, as agreed, shall be pursued,” Ferrer said.

“Many of these items are similar to what we are discussing now under the power-sharing annex,” she said.

Ferrer said the Aquino administration is working to address all commitments made by previous administrations through the tripartite review process even as he called on the MNLF “to take this path with us.”

The meeting is the fifth in a series of the tripartite review process held since 2007, after the MNLF complained that the government has been reneging on the provisions of the peace pact.

Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Undersecretary Jose Lorena told The STAR it could not be ascertained if the MNLF would attend the meeting.

Lorena said the government has no intention to abrogate the peace agreement with the MNLF, contrary to recent claims of its leader Nur Misuari.

“The Aquino administration has always engaged the MNLF since 2010 and will continue to do so under the existing mechanism as we have conveyed to the OIC – Peace Committee for Southern Philippines,” Lorena said. – With Jose Rodel Clapano, Edith Regalado