Bounty hunters could worsen situation in Mindanao - AFP

MANILA, Philippines – The reported plan of bounty hunters and vigilante groups joining the manhunt for the two Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) commanders behind last month’s attacks would only worsen the security situation in Mindanao, the military said.

Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) operations chief Brig. Gen. Jorge Segovia said bounty hunters are not under any form of control by the government and they could be subject of combat operations.

“There shouldn’t be more than two sides of the conflict, otherwise, it might worsen the situation,” Segovia said.

Segovia, the military’s spokesman for the conflict, pointed out the bounty being offered by the government should be nothing more than providing the authorities any information leading to the arrest of the renegade rebel commanders.

“While citizens’ arrest is provided for under the system, any private armed group that is not under some form of control from the government is not a welcome development, because it might worsen the situation. They might not be able to distinguish who the real targets are,” he said.

The government has put a bounty of P20 million on the heads of Ameril Umbra Kato and Abdurahman Macapaar, also known as Commander Bravo, for leading the recent attacks on villages in Central Mindanao that killed scores and displaced thousands of people.

On Saturday, the vigilante group Ilaga announced that they would be joining the manhunt for the two rebel commanders and share the P20-million reward with the families of the casualties.

Segovia, however, said Ilaga and the participation of other groups hunting the MILF commanders couldn’t be tolerated since other armed groups authorized to help the military are the Civilian Armed Forces Geographical Units (CAFGUs) and the Civilian Volunteer Organizations (CVOs).

The threat of attack by the MILF rebels prompted several communities to arm themselves with the Ilaga announcing that they would take the battle by hunting down the rebels.

Authorities, on the other hand, helped out in defending the villagers from possible attacks by distributing shotguns to civilian volunteers as members of police auxiliary units.

The move to arm civilians elicited criticisms from various sectors, including the Commission on Human Rights (CHR), which said it could create more security problems in the region.

The mounting criticisms prompted the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) to withdraw the plan.

PNP spokesman Chief Superintendent Nicanor Bartolome, however, denied criticisms had forced the PNP to abandon the plan to distribute shotguns to civilian volunteers.

Bartolome said authorities would prioritize the training and rigid screening of applicants before they are actually given the shotguns to help in police and military functions.

“The organization of police auxiliary units will now be given less priority as announced by Interior and Local Government Secretary Ronaldo Puno during his meeting with local government officials in Davao last Friday,” Bartolome said.

Give peace a chance

The rebel attacks came after the Supreme Court issued a temporary restraining order against signing the peace agreement, known as the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD), a limited autonomy pact between the government and MILF to allow the rebel group self-rule over an expanded autonomous region in Mindanao.

President Arroyo scrapped the deal after the MOA-AD was questioned over its constitutionality.

Notwithstanding the ceasefire agreement with the MILF, the government launched offensives to capture Kato and Macapaar.

Mrs. Arroyo also dissolved the government panel negotiating a peace agreement with the MILF.

Several sectors and lawmakers urged both sides to return to the negotiating table and allow the peace process to continue.

Senators Loren Legarda and Gregorio Honasan called on the government to take the initiative to talk peace with the MILF.

“The innocent civilians must be protected from the attacks, but it is wise more than necessary to exhaust all possible means for peace initiatives and this should be done with utmost concern now more than ever if both sides agree on a ceasefire,” Legarda said.

“The MILF and the government should not allow themselves to be viewed as hardliners that whoever blinks first would be the loser,” she added.

Honasan lamented the government failed in the peace process but this does mean abandoning the initiative.

Honasan said the government and the MILF can resume talks anew in good faith.

But Honasan, former rebel leader, said the government should not stop in the manhunt for Kato and Macapaar.

Honasan also warned the government against pursuing an all-out war against the MILF.

He said the government should focus its offensives in going after the recalcitrant MILF commanders to make them accountable for their misdeeds.

He said the hostilities and the subsequent scrapping of the MOA and the dissolution of the panel should be lessons for both the government and the MILF.

“This should signal the need for the government to consult the stakeholders in the peace talks. Let us not talk of being Christians and Muslims here. Let all the stakeholders air their concerns on the issue,” Honasan said.

As for the new members of the government peace panel, Honasan suggested that the President conduct dialogues with all concerned sectors in Mindanao, to include political and religious leaders, to determine how to go about the peace talks.

The fighting in Central Mindanao also forced more than 80,000 elementary and high school students to temporarily stop attending school, regional officials said.

More than a hundred schools in the provinces under the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) have shut down following the spate of encounters between government troops and the MILF.

ARMM officials said conflicts that rocked parts of the region also displaced 220,788 people, mostly poor Muslim residents that rely mainly on farming as source of income.

The value of crops destroyed and burned in the exchanges of artillery by MILF forces and the military reached P15.8 million, according to ARMM Gov. Datu Zaldy Ampatuan.

More than P3 million worth of water buffaloes, cows and goats were also lost when MILF guerrillas and soldiers clashed in one deadly encounter after another in Shariff Kabunsuan and Maguindanao.  – With Christina Mendez and John Unson