MAGUINDANAO, Philippines — The leader of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) yesterday set foot in a military camp here since the Muslim rebel group was founded in 1980.
Hadji Murad Ebrahim, chairman of the MILF’s central committee, visited the Army’s Camp Gonzalo Siongco in Maguindanao.
It was his first time to set foot in a military camp since leading the MILF in bloody encounters with the Army’s 6th Infantry Division.
“This for me is very historic. This is my first time to enter this military camp,” the 71-year-old Murad told his erstwhile enemies in Camp Siongco.
Murad graced the invitation of Maj. Gen. Cirilito Sobejana, commander of the 6th ID.
The 6th ID’s engagement with Murad was meant to sustain the cordiality between the MILF and officers and men of the military unit in Central Mindanao.
The MILF has more than 30 government-recognized enclaves in the region under its July 1997 interim ceasefire accord.
“Our enemies are oppression, injustice and exploitation, not the military as an organization. The armed conflicts we had were only circumstantial because the military is part of the government’s defense structure. We were never enemies,” Murad told the troops.
Sobejana said he was elated with Murad’s positive response to their invitation for him to meet the officials of 6th ID and its troops deployed in Central Mindanao.
A Moro officer in 6th ID, Col. Markton Abo, also the division’s civil-military relations officer, with their spokesman, Maj. Arvin Encinas, helped Sobejana facilitate the reception honors for Murad.
Murad and Sobejana have agreed to cooperate in ensuring the safety of the Jan. 21 plebiscite for the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL).
Murad started as a guerrilla in the Moro National Liberation Front in the early 1970s.
He and the Egyptian-trained cleric, Salamat Hashim, bolted from the group and organized the MILF shortly before 1980 due to irreconcilable differences with MNLF founder Nur Misuari.
The meeting of Murad and Army officials in Camp Siongco was also attended by representatives from the 1st Marine Brigade from Sultan Kudarat, where there is also a strong MILF presence.