MILF wary of Indonesia as 3rd-party facilitator

As it prepares to resume peace efforts with government, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front on Tuesday hinted it will not take kindly to "newcomer" Indonesia as a third-country facilitator. MILF peace panel senior member Lanang Ali made this statement amid indications that Indonesia may be tapped as facilitator in the peace talks, and even cited possible complications of changing Malaysia for the job. He said a third-country facilitator must have an institutional memory of the whole peace process to provide consistent guidance to it. “A newcomer will grope in the dark as to where the process started and where it is going, and oftentimes because of that lack of institutional memory it will steer the course of talks to unknown destination. Facilitation means recording and excellent communication, which Kuala Lumpur is good at both. Why take chances and put the whole process in possible unstable condition and in disarray?" Ali said in an article posted Tuesday on the MILF website. Since 2001, Malaysia has been the facilitator in the peace talks, when then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo took over the presidency. Ali said Indonesia is still facilitating the tripartite meeting involving the government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP), Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the Organization of Islamic Conference, which had its last session in May 2010 in Surabaya, Indonesia. “We do not want to complicate ground work already achieved under Malaysia’s facilitation," he added. According to him, Indonesia is still facilitating the talks with the MNLF, based on the idea of integration with the crafting of legislation as the main process of implementation. On the other hand, he said the GRP-MILF track is one that addresses the Moro Question through a negotiated political settlement that will eventually lead to the creation of a “state-substate" relationship. Meeting in Indonesia Meanwhile, MILF negotiating panel chief Mohagher Iqbal and Lawyer Datu Michael Mastura met with former Indonesian vice president Yusuf Kalla at the sidelines of the closing program of the Third Congress of World Religions in Yogyakarta, Indonesia on July 3. According to Igbal, in that meeting Kalla urged the MILF to continue the peace talks with the GRP, even as he praised Malaysia for providing effective facilitation of these talks. Kalla, the main actor in the negotiations with the leaders of the Free Aceh Movement that led to the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding on Dec. 9, 2002, was the guest of honor. Also in that meeting in Indonesia, Iqbal and Mastura briefed Kalla on the progress of the GRP-MILF Peace Talks achieved under Malaysia’s facilitation. The two also cited the OIC's efforts for the MNLF and MILF to form a coordinating committee that will hasten and improve their coordination. Muhammadiyah, which has a standing membership of 40 million, is a member of the International Contact Group (ICG) of the GRP-MILF Peace Talks. Thorny talks The GRP-MILF peace efforts resumed in 2001 after former President Arroyo assumed the presidency, but both sides had failed to reach an agreement. [MILF counting days left until signing of peace pact] The talks were endangered in 2008 after the Supreme Court junked a memorandum of agreement on ancestral domain (MOA-AD), that would have paved the way for the creation of a Bangsamoro juridical entity. Cotabato Vice Governor Emmanuel Piñol had led provincial officials in filing a petition for Prohibition and Mandamus before the Supreme Court, asking it to compel the government to make public the contents of a reported draft interim peace agreement. But they also asked it to restrain government from signing any interim peace agreement unless it is made public and consultations are properly conducted. — LBG/RSJ, GMANews.TV