MANILA/COTABATO CITY, 5 October — Malaysia has asked for postponement of peace talks planned to be held next Monday in Kuala Lumpur between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), officials said yesterday.
The government’s chief negotiator, Jesus Dureza, said the negotiations aimed at ending a decades-long separatist rebellion in the southern Philippines had been pushed back to a later date, probably Oct. 15 or 22. Dureza, speaking on local television, said Malaysian authorities had asked for the postponement because they needed more time to prepare the talks venue.
Malaysia is helping broker the talks between Manila and MILF, the biggest armed group fighting for an Islamic homeland in the southern Philippines. The two sides signed a cease-fire agreement in Kuala Lumpur in August but later accused each other of violations.
Up to 44 people were reported killed in renewed clashes last month on the southern island of Mindanao.
MILF military chief Al-Haj Murad Ebrahim said the guerrilla panel would bring up alleged military violations of the cease-fire in the forthcoming round of negotiations.
Lumad’s lament
Meanwhile, the MILF expressed doubt to the undated petition-letter addressed to Dureza and Murad Ebrahim raising concerns about their land in disputed areas in Mindanao.
The petition, purportedly coming from the “LUMAD” or Non-Muslim Indigenous People of Mindanao, raised objections to the establishment of MILF camps in some areas in the south which they claimed to be part of their ancestral domain.
It cited the sites of Camps Omar and Badr in Maguindanao, Camp Othman in North Cotabato and other parts of Sultan Kudarat and South Cotabato provinces as well as in Misamis Oriental.
The letter was signed by certain Al-Saliling, Deonato P. Mokedef, Marshall T. Daul, Edwin B. Ending, Gahamphong Malanaw VI and Roman Dayaan, all claiming to be leaders of indigenous tribes of Mindanao.
MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu, however, expressed suspicion on the issue brought out by the group saying, the term “Lumad” is a new creation, the roots of which cannot even be traced in Mindanao history.
“This being the case, the MILF has a reservation on the issue of lumad,” he clarified.
“Likewise the terminology used in the petition such as “stakeholder” is popularized only recently by the Arroyo administration along with their efforts in indoctrinating new policy which involve the local residents as part of the peace and development program introduced in the aftermath of the all out war in Mindanao,” Kabalu added.
On the issue of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), which the petition blamed for worsening the plight of the lumad, Kabalu said it is entirely unfair to involve the MILF on this particular concern.
“The MILF had never a party to the creation of the ARMM, and therefore it is more advisable that petitioner should direct the question to the government alone,” he said.
The MILF had never recognized the government’s creation of the ARMM, Kabalu added.
Aside from the issue of ancestral domain, the petitioners also talked about recognition, protection and promotion of lumad’s right to self-determination, right to intervene in the peace talks, and recognition to their declared peace zone areas all over Mindanao.
