Year after Zamboanga siege: Progress in peace efforts

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — September 2013 was a packed month for local officials in Central Mindanao who led extensive backdoor efforts to protect the region from a spillover of the deadly forays then by MNLF renegades in Zamboanga City.

Their efforts paid off to the point that no one from among the region's senior MNLF leaders—among them former Cotabato City Mayor Muslimin Sema, chairman of the group's largest faction, and his top lieutenant, Datu Dima Ambil of North Cotabato—gave support to their brigand comrades.

Among the first to initiate exploratory dialogues then with their MNLF constituents were Governors Emmylou Taliño-Mendoza and Esmael Mangudadatu, of North Cotabato and Maguindanao, respectively, and the spouse of Sema, Bai Sandra, the incumbent congressional representative of the first district of Maguindanao.

For Mangudadatu, presiding chairman of the Maguindanao provincial peace and order council, it was "an exercise" that made him better appreciate Islamic principles on consensus-building and dialogues in maintaining law and order in Muslim communities.

There are areas in Maguindanao's 36 towns where the MNLF has enclaves, some controlled by loyal followers of the now fugitive Nur Misuari, leader of the group that raided Zamboanga City, a rebellious venture that caused the dislocation of more than 100,000 Muslim and Christian residents.

Mangudadatu said he is thankful to the Army's 6th Infantry Division, the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) police and league of mayors in the province for helping him convince his constituent-MNLF leaders to refrain from initiating hostile actions while Misuari's men were on a rampage in Zamboanga City.

The MNLF's main bastion in Maguindanao, Camp Ebrahim, is located in Bago Inged District in Datu Odin Sinsuat town, a political bailiwick of Rep. Sema and her uncle, Mayor Datu Ombra Sinsuat.

While Misuari's men, led by the radical cleric Habier Malik, were fighting government forces in Zamboanga City, followers of the Sema couple were peacefully working in their farms in Datu Odin Sinsuat and nearby towns.

Sema, who served as vice-mayor of Cotabato City from 2010 to 2013, told reporters then that he and his followers could not embark on anything provocative in keeping with the September 2, 1996 government-MNLF peace agreement.

"We can't turn our backs from that peace agreement. We are for the peaceful settlement of any misunderstanding between the government and the MNLF with regards to the implementation of that agreement," Sema told reporters three days after the hostilities in Zamboanga City erupted.

Previous allegations of non-compliance by either side with some of the provisions of the agreement are still being settled via a tripartite process started in 2007 by representatives from the government, the MNLF and the office of the secretary-general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

The OIC, a bloc of more than 50 Muslim countries, including petroleum-exporting states in the Middle East and North Africa, helped broker the now 19-year government-MNLF peace agreement.

Mendoza, who has jurisdiction over 17 North Cotabato towns and the provincial capital, Kidapawan City, also succeeded in convincing MNLF leaders in the province, some of them identified with Misuari, to just stand down in their camps amid the September 2013 hostilities in Zamboanga City.

MNLF members in government-recognized "peace zones" in North Cotabato's first district, which Misuari frequented before September 2013, readily reciprocated with Mendoza's peace initiatives.

Some North Cotabato-based MNLF commanders even signed manifestos denouncing Misuari and Malik to show sincerity in their dealings with Mendoza.

Malik, a diabetic, was reported to have died somewhere in Sulu from infected gunshot wounds he sustained in an encounter with pursuing soldiers two days before the conflict in Zamboanga City ended.

Misuari has been in hiding since, wanted in connection with the bloody mutiny.

The September 2013 Zamboanga siege was not Misuari's first violent turnaround from the MNLF's peace agreement with government.

In 2001, while an incumbent governor of ARMM, Misuari led a revolt in Sulu after then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo anointed the MNLF's foreign affairs officer, Parouk Hussin, as her favored candidate for the region's top post in an electoral exercise slated in the same year.

Misuari feared the 2001 ARMM regional polls, with candidate Hussin having an edge as an administration candidate, would boot him out of power.

More than 60 people, including soldiers and MNLF members were killed while more than a hundred others were injured in the Misuari-instigated Sulu uprising.

Misuari tried to flee somewhere abroad via the country's southern backdoor after the incident, but was intercepted by the Malaysian coastguard and eventually landed in a police detention facility in Sta. Rosa, Laguna, where he was incarcerated for five years.

He was freed from detention through the intercession of some influential friends identified with President Arroyo, among them former ARMM Gov. Zaldy Ampatuan, now incarcerated in connection with the infamous November 23, 2009 "Maguindanao Massacre."