MILF fighters cheer upon the signing of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro in March last year. (file)
While vowing to cooperate with the Senate investigation into the bloody Mamasapano incident on January 25, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front on Tuesday stressed that it remains “a revolutionary organization” and will remain one until its peace agreement with the government is “fully implemented.”
The assertion was made in a letter from MILF chief negotiator Mohagher Iqbal to Senator Grace Poe, chairman of the Senate committee on public order and dangerous drugs, in which he informed her that he was the designated representative of the organization to the Mamasapano hearings but that he would appear only after they wrap up their probe into the deaths of 44 Special Action Force commandos, 18 MILF fighters and at least five civilians during the clash that broke out in the course of a mission to get wanted Malaysian terrorist Zulkifli bin Hir, alias “Marwan.”
"Please bear with us as we deal with the institution of the Senate for the first time," Iqbal's said in the letter as he added that, while the MILF "has accepted your invitation" to participate in the hearings, it "is a revolutionary organization."
"While we have signed a peace agreement" to end 18 years of fighting with government, he said the pact is "still to be implented" and "until (it is) fully implemented," they would remain a revolutionary organization.
Iqbal’s assertion drew a strong reaction from Senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who chairs the committee on local government, which was conducting hearings on the proposed Bangsamoro Law until the Mamasapano incident led him to suspend proceedings.
Marcos asked whether “we are still at war with the MILF” and if the organization was “still fomenting revolution until the peace agreement is implemented.”
He pointed out that this was “in direct contradiction to what was told us during (the) hearings on the BBL” that “we have a cessation of military or revolutionary action” and that the “process of decommissioning had already begun.”
Poe cut in, saying Ladiasan was not authorized to speak for the MILF leadership but nevertheless asking chief government negotiator Miriam Coronel-Ferrer for her interpretation of Iqbal’s statement.
Coronel-Ferrer stressed that, “we are not at war with them,” even as she acknowledged that the long-standing ceasefire between the MILF and government had been “broken” on January 25.
Nevertheless, she stressed that there is a “roadmap leading to the transformation (of the MILF) from an armed group to an unarmed group” participating in political processes and that this roadmap includes the decommissioning of the MILF’s weapons.
http://www.interaksyon.com/article/104761/we-remain-a-revolutionary-organization---milf
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