MILF advisor denies giving Marwan free pass in Maguindanao

COTABATO CITY, Philippines - An advisor to the central committee of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) denied having issued a written imprimatur for slain Malaysian terrorist Marwan to freely move around in Maguindanao.

Boy Hashim, a military advisor to the MILF, said he does not know either the Marcus Allen Frishman who has a copy of the certification, which he tried to use to support his claim for the bounty on Marwan’s head.

Marwan, whose name is Zulkifli bin Hir, was killed by members of the police’s elite Special Action Force in a dawn raid at his hideout in Barangay Inog-og in Mamasapano, Maguindanao last January 25.

“I heard the name Marwan but never met him. I don’t have knowledge of his being real. I did not bother about him,” Hashim said in a statement Friday.   

Hashim, who hails from Pikit town in North Cotabato, is a relative of the MILF’s founder, the late Imam Salamat Hashim, who studied Islamic theology at the Al-Azzar University in Cairo, Egypt.

Frishman is an American working as a “political consultant” in California, He has insinuated that he should be paid of the $5-million reward Marwan carried on his head for helping locate the Malaysian terrorist.

Frishman has copies of faxed letters and e-mails with certain US government officials detailing cooperation in locating Marwan’s whereabouts.

Among the documents was a certification by Hashim, printed on a letterhead stationery of the MILF, detailing “protection” for a certain Zulkifli bin Abdul.

The certification, in context, entitled Marwan, referred to as Zulkifli bin Abdul in the same document, to freely move around MILF camps in Maguindanao.

Hashim denied having dealt with Frishman.

Frishman said the MILF document was given to him by a certain Raymond “General” Liwag, who was introduced to him by his former staff, Filipino-American Ram Castillo.

Hashim said he does not know both Liwag and Castillo either.

Hashim started as a foreign-trained guerilla commander in the Moro National Liberation Front in the early 1970s.

He was among the first MNLF leaders that joined the MILF after its founder, the radical Salamat, bolted from the group due to irreconcilable differences with Nur Misuari and launched the breakaway organization.

Misuari’s MNLF now has three factions and he is wanted for leading a bloody mutiny in Zamboanga City in September 2013, staged to dramatize his group’s opposition to the government-MILF peace overture.