Massive info drive on Mindanao peace deal set

COTABATO CITY – The Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) will spend about P10 million on a massive information campaign aimed at making ordinary people understand what the framework agreement is all about.

ARMM Governor-in-charge Mujiv Hataman said on Friday the information drive could start after President Aquino and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) representatives sign the agreement, aimed at ending the Moro rebellion in the south, on Monday.

“We don’t want a repeat of the past mistake,” Hataman said, referring to the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD), which was heavily criticized and which was eventually stricken down by the Supreme Court.

He said the public regarded the MOA-AD as a “secret document” because there was no massive information drive on it.

Hataman said the P10 million the regional government planned on spending to make the framework agreement understood by the public would be coming from his office’s special purpose fund.

“Right now, we hear praises and adverse criticisms on the framework agreement – misconceptions and apprehensions – that’s why we need to have this massive information drive that would reach the grassroots level,” he said.

Among those being planned are barangay consultations and the printing of copies of the framework agreement for distribution in areas proposed under the new Bangsamoro entity.

Hataman said the output of the consultations will be forwarded to the Transition Commission, which will draft the basic law of the new entity, for consideration.