Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Cotabato City (Agenzia Fides) – Everyone is hoping that it is a real breakthrough: peace talks resume resume between the new Filipino government and representatives of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to address the delicate issue of peace in the south of the archipelago. Talks are expected on 9 and 10 February in Malaysia, representing the longed-for renewal after two years of interruption to dialogue. According to Fides sources among the missionaries in the Philippines, there are new hopes because, for the first time, the new Government of President Benigno Aquino, who took office last year, will take part at the negotiations with rebel groups, openly expressing their intentions and concrete proposals for restoring peace to the region of Mindanao.
The talks with the former Government of Gloria Arroyo were interrupted in August 2008, after the failure of the “Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain”, previously approved and then revoked by the Supreme Court, something which triggered a reaction from some Muslim groups in the South.
On the table at the negotiations on 9 February, there will be three essential issues: the age-old question of ancestral domain (ie. legal affiliation to territories); security, coveted by the entire civilian population, Christian, Muslim and indigenous; and the rehabilitation of refugees and the region's socio-economic development which, despite being one of the richest in resources and raw materials in the archipelago, is among the last according to the indicators of well-being and human development.
“It will be a trial in which good will is tried and statements of peace and reconciliation are issued by the Government,” comments Father Jun Mercado, missionary for the Oblates of Mary Immaculate to Fides, knowledgeable about the history of the situation and the dynamics of the conflict of the southern Philippines, which has claimed more than 120,000 victims and had a very negative impact on the lives of local people.
Fr Mercado tells Fides that the challenge which awaits the Government and the MILF, “will first of all to re-evaluate and implement the Peace Agreement of 1996. Bridging programs need to be created to manage the transition phase, at the levels of Government, public administration and social development. In this way the freedom of the Autonomous Queen of Muslim Mindanao, created in 1996, may be respected within the framework of the Filipino state. This is the starting point to ensure a lasting peace that the whole population of the southern Philippines has been seeking for decades.” (PA) (Agenzia Fides 28/1/2011)
