EDITORIAL – The peace dividend

Not too long ago the news from the Buliok complex in Pikit, North Cotabato alternated between bad and worse. Residents fled from constant fierce fighting between government troops and members of the Pentagon kidnapping gang as well as the group’s suspected coddlers in the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front. Villagers who opted to remain could barely survive as armed conflict disrupted all aspects of life.

These days the news from Buliok has improved. Government forces overran the enclave on Feb. 14, 2003. Declared a zone of peace, the complex is turning into a successful test area for peace with the MILF. Separatist militants have not put away their weapons for good. But instead of toting rifles when they move around the complex, MILF members and their sympathizers are now wielding farm implements.

The government provided corn and vegetable seeds, livestock and even tractors to the rebels to jump-start farming in the area. MILF members did their part by providing security to Army engineers who constructed farm-to-market roads that also linked villages to each other. The result is a five-fold jump in rice and corn production in the area in the past 12 months, and rising hopes that villagers can finally look forward to a life without armed conflict.

The government resumes formal peace talks with the MILF next month in Malaysia. The talks must tackle concerns raised by local government officials in Mindanao over reported plans to give the MILF jurisdiction over areas that the separatists claim as ancestral domain. Local officials say the plan is being used by the MILF as an excuse for fresh recruitment.

The MILF must also come clean on persistent reports that some of its members are providing sanctuary to foreign militants belonging to Jemaah Islamiyah, the Southeast Asian terror cell responsible for deadly bombings in the region, as well as Abu Sayyaf members including chieftain Khadaffy Janjalani. The JI militants are said to be conducting terrorist training in MILF-protected areas.

Buliok is showing what peace can bring. Peace in Mindanao, however, is fragile and cannot take root in an environment that condones terrorism. Peace will prevail only when there is a sincere renunciation of violence as a means to an end.