Mamasapano: a lesson for future presidents
ONE LESSON that prominently stands out from the Mamasapano incident to be learned by aspiring presidents, as a job retention strategy, is this: ensure the election of a bad vice president, the more...
View Article‘Constitutionally compliant’ BBL
There is a consensus between Congress and Malacañang that the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) that will be enacted is within the framework of the Constitution and consistent with national laws. What is a...
View ArticleWhere do the ‘lumad’ lie in the BBL?
IT WAS Philippine history scholar William Henry Scott who titillated us with an astounding proposition on the indigenous peoples of the Philippines. Scott narrated how, in one history conference, a...
View ArticleBBL a matter of public interest
The Mamasapano incident jolted Alliance for Good Governance, Peace and Social Justice, a civic advocacy group that I chair, into realizing that the continuing armed conflicts have exacerbated social...
View ArticleBBL splits Congress
CANBERRA—The effort of the Aquino administration to ram through Congress the passage of the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law has run into an impasse between the Liberal-Party-dominated House of...
View ArticleThoughts on the peace process
It is interesting to note that some of our legislators are raising fundamental questions about the Bangsamoro Basic Law only now.
View ArticleSymbolic and real
Tomorrow, the decommissioning of weapons and combatants of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front begins with a symbolic ceremony to which members of the chambers of Congress who will decide on the fate of...
View ArticleMILF’s proof of ‘trust and sincerity’?
After being accused of massive corruption, expect Vice President Jejomar Binay to be accused of lying. He has been going around the country delivering campaign speeches, making election promises,...
View ArticleWhere to now, Bangsamoro Basic Law?
The “move” to amend the Charter is overdue, but derailing the Bangsamoro Basic Law at this stage would be tantamount to relegating all the sacrifices and gains, made these past two years and more by...
View ArticleZareenah’s ‘bapa’
The little girl in a red T-shirt with the words “You’ve got to give it some love” ran around the mini-conference room at the headquarters of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in Camp Darapanan in...
View ArticleDeactivating MILF weapons and forces
THE ANNEX on Normalization signed between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) on Jan. 25, 2014 is one of integral documents comprising the Comprehensive Agreement on the...
View ArticleDecommissioning amid loose guns
PRESIDENT Aquino’s final State of the Nation Address (Sona) drew strong applause for his call to support the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) and the cause of an enduring peace in Mindanao.
View ArticleGeopolitics: Philippines, China, Nigeria
Philippines. The controversial Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), which aims to give vast powers to the rebel group Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), is less about peace and more about politics. Lately, a...
View ArticleBangsamoro, one more try
THE BEST way to kill any discussion on the Bangsamoro is through prejudice. Considering all the opposing views on the proposed Bangasamoro Basic Law, I think it is well on its way to rigor mortis. It...
View ArticleIs Pinocchio’s nose getting longer?
HE HAS lied before. What reason should there be to believe he would not lie again? In last week’s dialogue with the Inquirer staff, President Aquino said “there is an alternative version of what...
View ArticleWho killed Marwan?
Who killed Marwan? How was he killed? These and many other questions are supposed to have been answered by the various official reports issued on the Jan. 25 Mamasapano incident.
View ArticleMILF must first prove sincerity by eradicating ASG
THE APRIL 2 editorial (“More banditry”) brought to the fore once more the menace the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) has been foisting upon this country. Why this ragtag group of only about 300...
View ArticleMILF, MNLF told: Join gov’t fight vs terrorism
Presidential Communications Secretary Martin Andanar appealed to the Filipino people to help the government fight “faceless” terrorists following the bombing of a night market in Davao City last Sept....
View ArticleFavor for Misuari, but no justice for Zamboanga siege victims
I REALLY can’t believe how our Department of Justice decided to withdraw the arrest warrant against Moro National Liberation Front’s Nur Misuari after he facilitated the release of hostages being held...
View ArticleA recipe for national dismemberment
It seems President Duterte wants peace “at all costs”—even at the expense of selling out the nation to ideologues who make us sick. His over-aggressive “peace” initiatives with the Moro Islamic...
View ArticleIndependent?
Questions remain about the unfortunate police operation that led to the Mamasapano tragedy two years ago.
View ArticleMNLF, MILF harboring terrorists?
President Du30 was reported to have “pleaded with” (read: begged) the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) not to provide safe haven for...
View ArticleWhat to do with Mindanao?
In 2015, when the peace talks between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front seemed inexplicably trapped in the congressional mire, MILF chair Al Haj Murad Ebrahim met with a group of...
View ArticleStrategic drift
The most difficult way to conduct a war is to do it along two or more fronts. Carl von Clausewitz famously wrote, war is the continuation of politics by other means. If so, one must ask: What kind of...
View ArticleWhy the MILF prefers BBL over federalism
“Only a shift to federalism will satisfy the Bangsamoro,” President Duterte has stated several times. This, according to him, will correct the historical injustice committed against the Muslim...
View ArticleAnother chance for a Bangsamoro
Barring hitches, the latest version of the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) will be in the legislative agenda when Congress resumes its session on July 24.
View ArticleBridging leadership in the peace process
The peace process is in a stalemate, and this is not good. Our Muslim brothers and sisters recently celebrated the final rites of the annual Hajj—Eid’l Adha, or “The Feast of the Sacrifice,” reflecting...
View ArticleForging peace with MILF, NDFP
Historically, armed conflicts with religious and ideological overtones, whether here or elsewhere in the world, are the toughest to disentangle. However, after decades of on-and-off negotiations, peace...
View Article‘Good to start’
That overused term preferred by diplomats is appropriate here: The congressional bicameral conference committee version of the Bangsamoro Basic Law, hammered into shape at the end of six contentious...
View ArticleHistoric moment
It is perhaps the most important legislation passed under President Duterte’s leadership. But where was the sense of occasion, the honoring of the historic moment, when the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL)...
View ArticleDelivering on the Bangsamoro Organic Law
In my recent conversation with Murad Ebrahim, chair of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, on his plans in the wake of the passage of the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL), I sensed both relief and trepidation.
View ArticleLife after disengaging from the MILF
The disengagement process is part of the completion of the United Nations and MILF Action Plan to ensure that children are not recruited and used in armed conflict.
View ArticleBeyond autonomy
The Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao is at another juncture in its history as a region. On Jan. 21 next year, a plebiscite will be held that will shape the configuration of the area and the destiny...
View ArticleThe real transition for the Bangsamoro
Chief Minister Al Hajj Murad Ebrahim, must be equal to its mandate as interim government of the expanded Moro region if it is to retain its leadership in the first elections of 2022.
View ArticleCan MILF help restore peace and order?
In reference to the news “Abu Sayyaf atrocities spook foreign investors — Duterte” (3/5/19), allow me to ask this question: What is the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) doing about it now that...
View ArticleStripped naked by history
It’s taken over half a century since that infamous massacre of Jabidah, 23 young Muslim soldiers in Marcos’ clandestine attack force on Sabah, to arrive at this new moment in Mindanao.
View ArticleHarsh Realities
The challenge of accepting that the old normal is gone and that a new normal is emerging is in not understanding what the old normal was and why it is no more. Or, perhaps, we should not accept the old...
View ArticleDemocracy’s U-turn in the Bangsamoro
In the face of a pandemic and a spike in violence in the second half of 2020, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front-led Bangsamoro Transitional Authority is making a bid for no-el (no elections) and...
View ArticleAdvancing the transitional justice agenda (1)
In 2016, the Transitional Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC) presented a four-volume report to the peace panels of both the Government of the Philippines (GPH) and the Moro Islamic Liberation...
View ArticleCorruption in the way of peace
A senator has alleged that commanders of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) are taking 50-percent cuts from the P100,000 cash grant given by the government to each rebel returnee in exchange for...
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