BIFM: MILF camp better venue for framework deal signing

From the Philippine Star (Oct 16): MILF camp better venue for framework deal signing

The brigand Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Movement (BIFM) on Tuesday said that the signing of the "Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro" between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) should have been done at Camp Darapanan, the Moro group's main camp in Maguindanao province. BIFM spokesman Abu Misry Mama told reporters that the signing of the agreement in Camp Darapanan would have created the impression that the government is sincere in its peace talks with the MILF. “It was the government that gained something out of the signing of the agreement in Malacañang, not the Bangsamoro people,” Misry said in Filipino, in heavy Maguindanaon accent. Mama said that as a “token position,” they will just have to “wait and see” even if they are convinced that the government-MILF compact will not solve the so-called Bangsamoro problem. “Only Moro independence is the answer. Nothing can be a better medicine to the Bangsamoro problem,” Mama told reporters. Mama said the MILF should have haggled that the signing of the agreement be held at Camp Darapanan, not at the seat of the national government that was a party to a bloody conflict that ravaged many Southern communities for decades. “The Bangsamoro people would have been happier if that was the scenario,” Mama said....

http://www.philstar.com/nation/article.aspx?publicationsubcategoryid=200&articleid=860123