ZAMBOANGA CITY, 10 March 2006 — A senior commander of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), who was reported to have quelled an alleged plan to oust Chairman Murad Ebrahim, yesterday said the separatist group was intact and that reports of a coup plot were false.
Musanip Abdullah, also known as Commander Adan, said everyone in the MILF supports the leadership of Murad.
“I deny reports attributed to me by the media about the failed coup plot against Brother Murad Ebrahim,” he told Arab News by phone from his base in Mindanao.
A report by the Philippine Daily Inquirer, quoted Abdullah and another senior leader, Bitol Mateng alias Commander Guevara, as saying that their forces had surrounded the village of Pidsandawan in Rajah Buayan town of Maguindanao province to prevent other guerrillas from massing up and protesting against the leadership of Murad.
The renegades were led by Ameril Umbrah Kato and Wahid Tondok, who support Samir Hashim, younger brother of the late MILF chair Salamat Hashim, said the report.
Abdullah and Mateng, Murad’s comrades since their days with the Moro National Liberation Front before the MILF broke away in 1978, reportedly want the hard-line Samir to become MILF chair.
Col. Frank del Prado of the Philippine Army’s 6th Infantry Division said the two MILF factions earlier clashed in Mamasapano and Datu Saudi Ampatuan towns in Maguindanao.
Abdullah, however, yesterday denied having talked about the siege, and other MILF leaders also sought to deny any such confrontation.
“Ask anybody in the MILF and they will tell you that Brother Murad Ebrahim is their only leader. And all of us, from the foot soldiers in the mountain to senior leaders, are all for Murad Ebrahim, and we are all intact and united,” he said.
MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu also maintained that the reports could be a ploy by those opposing the peace talks. “There could be efforts to divide the MILF, but our group is intact and we are all united and behind one leader and that is Murad Ebrahim,” he said.
Mohagher Iqbal, the chief MILF peace negotiator, on Thursday dismissed the report as “plain rumors.”
The young Hashim is allegedly opposed to Murad’s moderate stand on the peace talks, and wanted the MILF to pursue the establishment of a strict Islamic state in Mindanao as the only solution to the secessionist problems in the South.
Secretary Jesus Dureza, chief peace adviser of President Gloria Arroyo, said the peace talks would be seriously affected if the reports were proven true.
“If it is true, then it could have a serious effect on the government peace talks with the MILF,” he said.
