Presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda PHOTO/INQUIRER
Malacañang is confident that the government would hammer out a final peace agreement with secessionist rebels within the year, minus the hitches that derailed an Arroyo administration-initiated deal.
Presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda confirmed pronouncements by Marvic Leonen, chairman of the government negotiating panel, that a framework agreement with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) was about to be sealed.
The framework agreement serves as the blueprint for the final peace agreement, officials said.
“I’m sure Marvic Leonen will not be issuing a statement unless he is confident that a framework agreement is in sight,” Lacierda said in a Malacañang briefing. “Yes, we are very hopeful that we will have a signing before the end of the year.”
Both the government and MILF panels, now meeting in Kuala Lumpur for four-day talks, indicated that the framework agreement could be signed as early as this week.
According to reports, a peace deal with the MILF would lead to an expanded autonomous area for Muslims in Mindanao before President Aquino steps down in 2016.
Lacierda said recent developments in the negotiations augured well for the signing of a final peace agreement.
“Suffice it to say that the talks have been moving forward, the talks have been fruitful,” he said. “We are optimistic that we will be having a signed agreement before the end of year.”
Smell of success
Lacierda also said this time the government would ensure that the final agreement would not be derailed by serious issues, as had happened in the scrapped memorandum of agreement on ancestral domain forged by the Arroyo administration with the MILF.
“You can be certain that we have learned from the lessons of the MOA-AD and we are cognizant of the decision laid down by the Supreme Court,” he said.
In 2008, the deal expanding the Bangsamoro territory was met with protests. Its signing was aborted, prompting attacks by the MILF on villages in central Mindanao and escalated into clashes with government troops, forcing hundreds of thousands of residents to flee their homes.
The Supreme Court later ruled that the deal was unconstitutional.
The current discussions center on the extent of power, revenues and territory to be granted to a Muslim-administered region. It would be the most significant progress in years of negotiations on ending a rebellion that has left more than 120,000 people dead and held back development in the southern Philippines.
New era of peace
Rebel negotiator Mohagher Iqbal said at the talks’ resumption that they are “now on the home stretch and the smell of success is reinforced every day.”
Iqbal warned that if the negotiations are not concluded soon, opponents might endanger a final deal. A breakaway rebel group has opposed the talks, and some Christian politicians, wary of losing land and power to minority Muslims, have been accused in the past of undermining the negotiations.
“If we cannot conclude it soon successfully, now that we are at the brink of the exercise, we will be in trouble,” Iqbal said. “The greatest source of risk comes from spoilers, leaders, and parties who believe that these … negotiations threaten their power and interests.”
Leonen said that “to state that what we hope to be able to do again in the next few days is historical is definitely an understatement.”
“We are on the brink of layering the written predicates that can frame the process of building trust as we usher in an era of peace, of hope and of recovery,” Leonen said. But he added that both sides “must always remain guarded in our optimism” because of the challenges in implementing the political solution contained in the agreement.
Iqbal earlier told The Associated Press that his group would not lay down its weapons until a final accord is concluded, adding that insurgents could form a political party and run in democratic elections to get a chance at leading the autonomous region for which they have been fighting. With a report from AP