Ghazali Jaafar, guerilla fighter turned peace champion

Bangsamoro Transition Commission Chair Ghazali Jaafar (2nd from right) joins President Rodrigo Duterte in the turnover of a draft of the newly proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) in Malacañang on July 17, 2017. Rolando Mailo/PPD

Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) vice chairman Ghazali Jaafar started out in his younger years mobilizing the youth into activism and being part of a guerrilla movement. But in the end, he went on to become one of the most prominent figures in the historic establishment of the Bangsamoro region, seen to be a huge step toward bringing lasting peace in southern Philippines.

Jaafar, who was the Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC) chair, died on Wednesday morning due to kidney failure. 

Jaafar, born on May 6, 1944, founded a youth group when he was in high school that nurtures the sense of activism among students and even out of school youth in Cotabato City.

He took up Political Science at the the Notre Dame College, dreaming to be a lawyer.

He later became vice hair of the MILF, which has waged a decades-long guerrilla war, first for independence and later autonomy for the large Islamic minority in the south of the largely Catholic Asian nation.

President Rodrigo Duterte joins Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC) chairman Ghadzali Jaafar in prayer during the Bangsamoro Assembly held at the Old Provincial Capitol in Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao on Monday, November 27, 2017. Albert Alcain/PPD

Amid his guerrilla fighter profile, Jaafar was credited for steps in pursuance of peace in the Mindanao region. Under his leadership, the then rebel group MILF started peace dialogues with the Philippine government starting 1997.

In 2017, Jaafar was named one of the 21 members of the Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC) that was tasked to draft the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) which aims to end the decades of conflict in Mindanao.

After two years in 2018, the draft’s revised version Bangsamoro Organic Law was passed and Jaafar was appointed speaker of the parliament of the newly established Bangsamoro region.

In 2018, after the bicameral conference committee approved the BOL proposal, Jaafar was hospitalized in Metro Manila due to a heart problem, according to Prof. Raby B. Angkal, chief of staff of the Office of the Chairman of the BTC.

Angkal confirmed on Wednesday that Jaafar has died due to kidney failure at the Metro Davao Medical and Research Center in Davao City. — MDM, GMA News