Friday, August 08, 2008 Gov't-MILF MOU done deal, but not MOA: Nograles
THE memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) over the creation of a Bangsamoro Juridical Entity (BJE) is done and over with but the memorandum of agreement (MOA) is not.
This was the opinion made by House Speaker Prospero Nograles after the MILF claimed that the ancestral domain pact is a done deal since the MOA-AD was initialed by both the government and MILF peace panels.
"We have initialed the text of the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD) last July 27, 2008. The pact is a done deal. It is binding on the contracting parties who are obliged to refrain from acts that would defeat the object and purpose of their agreement," the MILF statement that was posted at www.luwaran.com reads.
Nograles said though that the MOA-AD is just a piece of paper and nothing more.
He said the only time that it will become effective is when Congress passes an enabling law to define the territorial limits and scope and authorize the call for plebiscite defining the manner, question, and scope.
"Last phase na lang yung voting for a yes or no during the plebiscite," Nograles said.
The Speaker said whatever agreement the government and the MILF entered into must also conform to the laws of the land and should be implemented within the legal framework.
"Or else any document entered can now amend the law," Nograles added.
The MILF asserted though that the signing ceremony in Malaysia that was stopped by the Supreme Court's temporary restraining order (TRO) was just to make formal what was already agreed upon.
"A public ceremony only gives importance politically to that done deal as a means to establish their consent to be bound to the initialed text of the MOA-AD," the MILF said.
Mohagher Iqbal, MILF chief negotiator, described the TRO as an internal process of the government, which has no binding effects on the MILF.
"The act of initialing the MOA-AD agreed text between the parties constitutes a signature of the Philippine government and MILF. Initialing was in fact done with a credible third party witness, the Malaysian government as facilitator of the talks since 2001," Iqbal said.
Secretary Rodolfo Garcia, government chief peace negotiator, and Secretary Hermogenes Esperon of the Office of the Presidential Assistant on the Peace Process (Opapp) likewise initialed the document for the government, while Mohagher Iqbal for the MILF, and Datuk Othman bin Abdulrazak-- chief peace facilitator, for the Malaysian government.
The MILF said as far as it is concerned, the SC TRO has no effect on the MOA-AD.
"Nothing! This is not even a setback to the MILF. We have the upper hand especially in the battle for moral ascendancy," Iqbal said in a report.
"It is the Arroyo administration which is shamed in the eyes of the international community. There were so many ambassadors already in the Malaysian capital to attend the signing ceremony, only to be told that it is cancelled at the last minute," he added.
Among those foreign dignitaries already in Kuala Lumpur are US ambassador to the Philippines Kristie Kenney and Ambassador Sayed ElMasry, adviser to Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) secretary general and special envoy for peace process in Southern Philippines.
Sayed ElMasry agreed to officially endorse the Philippine-MILF MOA-AD; in fact, his name appeared in the initialed document as one of the signatories.
The MOA-AD is the textual version of the consensus points arrived upon by the government and MILF peace panels for about four years of peace negotiations that commenced way back in December 2004. (BOT)
