No TRO yet for draft peace agreement

MANILA -- Government lawyers have been required by the Supreme Court to comment on the two petitions asking to declare unconstitutional the framework peace agreement between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

SC acting spokesperson Gleoresty Guerra said the Office of the Solicitor General has 10 days to file counter-arguments on the petitions separately filed by lawyer Ely Pamatong and Davao-based International Ministries for Perfection and Party Against Communism and Terrorism Inc. (Imppact) late last year.

Associate Justice Marvic Leonen was the Aquino administration’s chief negotiator who helped craft the agreement aimed at ending decades of insurgency in the poverty-ridden Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (Armm).

Leonen had already step aside from hearing the case, especially after he was randomly chosen to be the writer of the Court’s decision. As a result, the petitions will have to be raffled again to another magistrate.

According to Pamatong’s petition, the agreement must be nullified because of its similarities with the 2008 Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD), which was declared unconstitutional by the SC.

Pamatong added that the agreement will violate 1976 Tripoli Agreement and the 1996 Final Peace Agreement with the Moro National Liberation Front (MILF) which rendered legitimacy to the Armm.

The Malaysia-brokered agreement, which will create a so-called Bangsamoro entity, was signed in Malacañang last October 15.(Virgil Lopez/Sunnex)