Thursday, June 26, 2008 Peace alliance urges resumption of talks
KIDAPAWAN CITY -- A group of Moro peace advocates in Central Mindanao has urged the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to resume their stalled talks.
To drumbeat their calls, the Mindanao Alliance for Peace (MAP), a multi-sectoral group of peace advocates in Mindanao, is set to hold a mass rally in Cotabato City, around 9 a.m. on Saturday.
Bobby Benito, head of the Information Committee of the Center for Just Peace and one of the conveners of the MAP, said the delay in the resolution of Mindanao conflict as a result of the impasse in the Philippine government-MILF talks is "sending a wrong signal," especially to the "grassroots" or the people in the countryside.
"We fear (that) Mindanao will face again more ravaging hostilities in which, people of Mindanao are the most and seriously affected," Benito said.
The conflict in Mindanao, he added, can only be resolved through a "negotiated political settlement."
"We the people in the grassroots Mindanao desire for a meaningful result of the peace process. It is the only way to put an end to centuries-old Mindanao problem," he said.
The peace talks between the Philippine government and the MILF started way back in July 1997.
Catholic priest Eliseo Mercado, OMI, of the Kusog Mindanao, also a group of peace advocates in Central Mindanao, said that one of the highly contentious issues discussed before the peace talks ended late last year was about the ancestral domain.
The component involved in the ancestral domain discourse, Mercado said, is the issue of governance.
"The crucial issues on the talk of governance shall touch on the establishment of the Bangsamoro Juridical Entity (BJE), its authority and the length of the transition and its relationship to the central government," he said.
Aside from the Muslims or the Bangsamoro, Mercado said there are two other crucial stakeholders who also claim franchise over the land -- the indigenous peoples and the Christian settlers, specifically in places and areas where they are "entrenched."
"Without a greater consensus among the stakeholders, the feasibility and the sustainability of any peace agreement will be in question. But consensus does not only involve the actual peoples in the areas but also a national consensus. While this is very ticklish to say the least, but for any peace agreement to fly, you need a national consensus," he explained. (Malu Cadelina Manar)
