Moro execs renew commitment to Mindanao peace process

COTABATO CITY -- The manifesto of support to Malacañang’s counter-terrorism thrusts Moro mayors and governors signed last week could be their last chance to show commitment in rebuilding a war-torn homeland now seriously threatened by Islamic militancy.Two of the signatories to the document, Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu and Regional Gov. Mujiv Hataman of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, separately said on Sunday that they will do their best to keep their promise to support President Rodrigo Duterte’s peace and security programs for troubled Mindanao provinces. We placed our pride and honor on the line as we signed the document. We acknowledge the importance of having lasting peace, a durable kind of peace in our homeland through good governance and unity among local sectors, Hataman said.The crafting of the manifesto capped off Thursday’s local government summit in Davao City of mayors and governors from across ARMM, which President Rodrigo Duterte attended as keynote speaker.In a speech, Duterte urged ARMM’s 116 mayors, five provincial governors and regional officials to help him put closure to the nagging Moro problem via a shift from the country’s present republican type of government to federalism.The president said federalism will provide the Moro people the kind of political and administrative empowerment they have been fighting for since the 1970s.The autonomous region covers Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur, both in mainland Mindanao, and the islands of Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi, common bastions of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and the Moro National Liberation Front.Participants to the ARMM local government summit admitted to reporters their apprehensions on the continuing spread of militant groups in their municipalities in ARMM, rising in the fashion of the Independent State of Iraq and Syria.Hataman had told reporters during the summit only by strong cooperation among local executives, the religious communities, the police and the military can local fanatical groups espousing Islamic militancy be booted out of the autonomous region.Maguindanao, where Mangudadatu is now a second-termer governor, has also been made troublesome by the presence there of the outlawed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF), which splintered from the MILF in 2010.The BIFF has also been using the black ISIS flag as its revolutionary banner.ARMM officials are confident their current costly infrastructure project in many parts of the region will bolster the efforts of Malacañang and the Armed Forces of the Philippines in putting a decisive end to Islamic militancy now spreading in many areas in the region.Hataman on Sunday said there have been improvements in the security situation in hostile areas in the autonomous region, ushered in by the completion of infrastructure projects that provided local communities convenient access to schools, health facilities and trading centers.The BIFF in Maguindanao, the Dawlah Islamiya in Butig town in Lanao del Sur and the Abu Sayyaf in Sulu, the country’s most dangerous and poorest province, are all using underdevelopment as a pitch to foment public hatred to government.Mangudadatu said the manifesto they signed during the ARMM local government summit at the SMX Convention Center in Davao City could be the final test for their dedication to help Malacañang, the AFP and the Philippine National Police drive away militant factions now sowing havoc in the autonomous region. President Duterte had told us in his speech he do know yet what will happen if within his term we cannot all together put a stop to all of these problems, Mangudadatu said.Mangudadatu said he will expand in the next two years to at least 20,000 the slots of his college scholarship program for children of poor Moro peasants in troubled towns in Maguindanao. Education can help fight religious extremism, Mangudadatu said.Local executives present in the summit said they also support the domestic peace and development initiatives of the present ARMM administration, credited for the construction of more than a thousand kilometers of roads, dozens of bridges, new seaports, markets and barangay centers in far-flung towns in the past four years.