MILF, MNLF together on peace and security programs

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Stakeholders see better days soon for the Bangsamoro region with the convergence now of the Moro National Liberation Front and the Moro Islamic Liberation on development objectives for the local communities.

The MNLF commemorated on Thursday the 25th anniversary of its final peace pact with the national government, jointly brokered by former President Fidel Ramos and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, or OIC.

The OIC is a bloc of more than 50 Muslim states, including wealthy petroleum exporting countries in the Middle East and North Africa.

North Cotabato Vice Gov. Emmylou Taliño Mendoza said Saturday she and her constituents appreciates the MNLF-MILF cooperation in furthering the peace and development programs of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao in 63 barangays in her province.

The still 28-month BARMM, which replaced the now defunct Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao in March 2019, is a product of 22 years of peace talks between Malacañang and the MILF.

The government-MILF peace process that lasted for more than two decades, facilitated by Malaysia, was capped off with the crafting by both sides of two compacts, the 2012 Framework Agreement on Bangsamoro and the 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on Bangsamoro.

“We are witnessing how the now allies MNLF and MILF are cooperating in improving the lives of the residents of the 63 barangays in our province that are now part of BARMM,”  Mendoza said.

Mendoza was referring to the 63 barangays in different North Cotabato towns whose residents voted in favor of the inclusion of their villages into BARMM’s territory during a plebiscite in 2019 that resulted in the ratification of the region’s charter, the Republic Act 11054.

BARMM Labor Minister Romeo Sema, who is MNLF’s vice chairman for political affairs, said Saturday they silently commemorated on Thursday the 25th anniversary of their peace agreement with the national government.

“We are praying for the compliance by the government with certain provisions of this agreement that have not been implemented fully yet,” Sema, also a member of the BARMM interim parliament, said, without elaborating.

Sema said the MNLF is helping the BARMM leadership forge ahead with its development programs for Muslim, Christian and non-Moro indigenous communities in the provinces of Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi and in the cities of Marawi, Lamitan and Cotabato.

The chief minister of BARMM, Ahod Ebrahim, is chairman of the central committee of the MILF.

Ebrahim and some BARMM officials were followers of the late Islamic theologian Salamat Hashim, who helped Nur Misuari establish the MNLF in the early 1970s and, subsequently, founded the MILF in 1980.

“The most tangible outcome of the Sept. 2, 1996 peace agreement between the government and the MNLF is the cessation of hostilities between our group and state security organizations, including the police,” Sema said.

Mendoza, who, as North Cotabato vice governor, actively supports Malacañang’s separate peace overtures with the MNLF and the MILF, said poverty and underdevelopment besetting Moro communities are easier addressed via joint efforts by both fronts.

“This so visible cooperation is an indication that there is strong camaraderie between these two groups now,” Mendoza said.

Sema said they want the BARMM government to succeed in its effort to alleviate the Moro sectors in its core territory from the bad effects of armed conflicts that for so many times rocked the region since the 1970s.   

“There is nothing wrong with us in the MNLF converging with the MILF for peace to spread faster through all four corners of BARMM whose residents have seen the ugliest faces of armed conflicts,” Sema said.