MILF slams MNLF leader over Bangsamoro tirades

COTABATO CITY , Philippines  ---The Moro Islamic Liberation Front on Thursday lambasted Nur Misuari of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) for insinuating that  Malaysia is using the MILF to bolster its claim on the resource-rich Sabah.

The Malaysian government has been helping facilitate the government-MILF talks since 2003.

Malaysia also leads the 60-member International Monitoring Team (IMT), which monitors the enforcement of the 1997 Agreement on General Cessation of Hostilities between the MILF and the government.

The MILF central committee was also slighted by Misuari’ scriticisms of the Franework Agreement on Bangsamoro that were aired on foreign media as well as other published reports.

Mohammad Ameen, chief secretariat of the MILF central committee, branded Misuari’s insinuation as unfounded.

“Malaysia's participation in the Mindanao peace process is for the good of Muslims in Southern Philippines,” Ameen said.

He said Misuari has committed a blunder with his statement attacking both the MILF and Malaysia.

Malaysia is a member of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, an influential bloc of more than 50 Muslim states,  including wealthy petroleum-exporting countries in the Middle East and North Africa. The OIC helped broker the September 2, 1996 final government-MNLF peace agreement.

“This is a total lie and completely fabricated,” Ameen said, referring to Misuari's statements..

Misuari’s latest tirades against the MILF have been uploaded on YouTube, according Ameen.

Misuari said Malaysia has been interfering with the domestic affairs of the Philippines through its “third party facilitation” of the GPH-MILF talks.

According to Ameen, it was the Philippine government, under then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, that sought Malaysia's help to  revive the GPH-MILF talks in 2003 following the suspension of the negotiations in 2000 as  a consequence of then President Joseph Estrada’s all out war against the rebel group.
 
Ameen said there is  also no truth to Misuari’s contentions that Malaysia has been sowing dissension among Moro sectors in Mindanao by focusing attention only on the government-MILF talks.

“How can Malaysia use the peace talks when the Sabah issue is not even an agenda of the on-going negotiations?” Ameen said.

He said Malaysia initiated the Bangsamoro Solidarity Conference in 2002 in a bid to unite the MNLF and the MILF to resolve the decades-old Moro issue.

“Why is Misuari so eager in backing up the Sabah claim now when he, throughout his 21 years of peace negotiation with  Philippine government, never raised that issue and that even the government-MNLF Final Peace Agreement in 1996 never had any reference to the Sabah claim?” Ameen said.

While Misuari’s group has been critical of the Sabah issue, the largest and most politically active MNLF faction,  led by Cotabato City Vice-Mayor Muslimin Sema,  has expressed support to a peaceful resolution to the Sabah crisis.

Sema’s group also said Malaysia  is  like a ‘big brother” to the MNLF.

“We even ought to thank Malaysia for giving us sanctuary, as MNLF members, in some of the islands in its territory, when we were still fighting the Armed Forces of the Philippines,” Sema said. - John Unson