‘PROTECT PEACE AT ALL COSTS.’ Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity (OPAPRU) Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. joins the wreath-laying rites in commemoration of the Patikul Massacre in Sulu province on Thursday (Oct. 10, 2024). Galvez maintained that the government is determined to protect the gains of the peace process. (Photo courtesy of OPAPRU)
MANILA – The government is determined to protect the gains of the peace process, Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity (OPAPRU) Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. said on Friday.
Galvez made the assurance during the commemoration of the 47th anniversary of the Patikul Massacre, noting that the incident is a painful reminder that there would be constant challenges to the peace process.
“What’s important is our determination to protect the fragility of the peace process. It must be sustained. It must be saved at all costs,” he said in a news release.
On Thursday, Galvez joined retired Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chief Gen. Emmanuel Bautista Jr. in visiting Patikul town in Sulu for the wreath-laying ceremony to commemorate the valor of the latter’s father, the late Brig. Gen. Teodulfo Bautista.
The older Bautista was on a peace mission for a dialogue with Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) leader Usman Sali when he and 34 other soldiers were slain by Sali’s forces at the town’s public market on Oct. 10, 1977.
READ: Army honors heroism of soldiers killed in 1977 Patikul massacre
The younger Bautista, appointed as AFP chief in 2013, urged the residents to safeguard and sustain the peace they are enjoying in Patikul and the rest of Sulu.
He said protecting the peace is a way to honor the people who made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of peace.
Galvez said President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. and Bautista were pursuing the path of peace that their respective fathers had begun.
“We have a President who wants to fulfill all the remaining government commitments in the signed peace agreements. The same thing, Gen. Bautista is leading exploratory talks with the communist groups to hopefully end the more than half-a-century problem of communist insurgency in the country,” he said.
In his 3rd State of the Nation Address in July, Marcos said his administration would honor the remaining obligations of the government in the peace agreements it had signed. (PNA)