Maguindanao expresses support to Bangsamoro anew

MAGUINDANAO, Philippines -  --- The provincial government assured the Third Party Monitoring Team (TPMT) it will support the implementation in Maguindanao of the normalization annex to the Framework Agreement on Bangsamoro (FAB).

The TPMT, presently chaired by former European Union Ambassador to the Philippines Alistair McDonald, was established by the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front to help push the GPH-MILF peace overture forward.

McDonald, accompanied by Steven Rood of the Asia Foundation, Huseyn Oruc of the Humanitarian Relief Foundation in Turkey, and Karen Tañada of the Gaston Ortigas Peace Center, discussed last weekend with Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu in Buluan town the importance of the normalization process, as stated in the FAB, which is the basis for the creation of a Bangsamoro political entity.

The meeting was also attended by members of different peace advocacy groups, led by Bobby Benito, representing the Mindanao Human Rights Action Center.

Mangudadatu said the provincial government had its “province-level normalization process,” through agricultural interventions and educational assistance for Moro communities, even before the GPH and MILF panels signed  the FAB on October 15, 2012.

The governor  reiterated that  he and his constituent-leaders will  support the implementation of a comprehensive Agreement on Bangsamoro.

Mangudadatu said a big bulk of the more than 4,000 beneficiaries of the Maguindanao Program for Educational Assistance and Community Empowerment (MagPEACE),  being bankrolled by his office, are children of active members of the MILF and the Moro National Liberation Front.

The governor started the MagPEACE, now spending for the schooling of thousands of college students, with only more than 700 scholars after his first election as Maguindanao governor in 2010.

“We are `children of war,’ the war in the 1970s, and we don’t want any repeat of the conflicts in those days that is why we have these programs,” Mangudadatu told McDonald and his companions, referring to the first outbreak of the Moro rebellion in the 1970s.

Mangudadatu said all of the provincial government’s peace-building projects are being closely coordinated with Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Teresita Quintos-Deles.

McDonald said among the major issues that needs to be addressed, to hasten the normalization process in the proposed Bangsamoro area, are the clan wars, called “rido” in the vernacular, and the presence of local private armed groups.

Mangudadatu said his office has just applied for a P2-billion loan from a government bank  to develop  arable lands in rebel territories into rubber and oil palm plantations for guerillas to have stable sources of income.

“Their guns can be licensed, subjected to ballistics recording by the government, [so they could] become security men of their own plantations,” Mangudadatu said.

The governor, who chairs the inter-agency provincial peace and order council, also assured McDonald and his companions of help in the continuing dissemination of the gains and prospects of the GPH-MILF peace efforts to the local communities.

One major concern for the provincial government now, according to Mangudadatu, is for the non-Moro indigenous people in Maguindanao --- the ethnic Tedurays and Teduray-Lambangian communities – to have a “good place” in the Bangsamoro territory.

Mangudadatu said he is convinced of the sincerity of both the government and MILF panels in their assurance of inclusivity in the peace process.