Libya agrees to lead monitoring team in Mindanao

COTABATO CITY –Libya has approved the government’s request to lead the International Monitoring Team (IMT) in lieu of Malaysia, which has started its gradual pull out from the multi-national peacekeeping contingent overseeing the ceasefire in the troubled south.

The Malaysian-led IMT, composed of police and military personnel from Malaysia, Brunei, Libya, and a rehabilitation expert from Japan, has been monitoring the ceasefire between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) since 2003.

Dr. Hadji Salem Adam, special envoy to Mindanao of the Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation (GICDF), told The STAR in an email from Tripoli that they have accepted the proposal of the Philippine government to lead the IMT, whose total pull out from Mindanao might lead to renewed hostilities between the military and the MILF.

The GICDF, chaired by Saiful Al-Islam Al-Gaddafi, is Libya’s conduit for humanitarian and peace-building projects in poor Muslim communities in foreign countries.

Adam, who was Libyan ambassador to the Philippines from 1999 to 2006, said Gaddafi, son of Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi, has approved Malacañang’s request to lead the IMT, whose peacekeeping mission in Mindanao was borne out of a bilateral security arrangement between the GRP and MILF peace panels.

The initial phase of Malaysia’s pull out from the IMT started last Saturday with the return of 21 Malaysian ceasefire monitors from the cities of Davao, Gen. Santos and Zamboanga. The rest of Malaysia’s 41 IMT members are to leave Mindanao by August.

The shaky GRP-MILF talks started January 7, 1997, but gained headway only in 2003 with the help of Malaysia as mediator.

“As always, Libya is ready to continue supporting the IMT. We are ready to lead the IMT now. The GICDF is willing to extend all the needed support for the GRP-MILF peace initiative to prosper,” Adam said in his e-mail.

Malaysian Maj. Gen. Datuk Mat Yasin Bin Mat Daud, head of the IMT, said they have mixed feelings about leaving Mindanao, their home for the last eight months.

“We are happy because we are returning to our families, but we are also sad because we are leaving behind an unfinished dream. We are still hoping to see the government and the MILF sign a peace treaty soon,” Mat Daud told reporters over the weekend.

The Malaysian general was apparently referring to the stalled peace process, made even more contentious by misunderstandings on the setting up of a Southern Muslim homeland to be covered by the front’s proposed governing mechanism, the Bangsamoro Juridical Entity (BJE).

The MILF’s proposed areas to be covered by the BJE include the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and about a thousand other parcels of land outside ARMM.

ARMM Gov. Datu Zaldy Ampatuan, a staunch supporter of the government’s separate peace overtures with the MILF and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), said he will support a Libyan-led IMT just the way his administration cooperated with Malaysia in its peacekeeping mission in the autonomous region.

Ampatuan’s executive secretary, lawyer Oscar Sampulna, said the 40-year-old governor, who is seeking re-election in the coming August 11 ARMM regional polls, is ready to convene all the region’s six provincial governors and more than a hundred mayors to openly express support for and commit to a Libyan-led IMT.

All the ARMM’s six provincial governors, two city mayors and more than a hundred municipal mayors are loyal political supporters of Ampatuan, who is the regional chairman for the autonomous region of the administration’s Lakas-Christian Muslim Democrats party.

“We are thankful to Libya for its continuing assistance to the Bangsamoro people and the Mindanao peace process. If Libya leads the IMT, then we welcome this as a signal that the Mindanao search for peace is still strong. We will support as usual the IMT like before,” Sampulna quoted Ampatuan as saying.

Undersecretary Rodolfo Garcia, chairman of the government peace panel in the peace talks with the MILF, said even with the Malaysian IMT group leaving, there is only a remote possibility of a large-scale violence erupting.

“The Armed Forces has assured us it will continue to preserve the primacy of the peace process,” said Garcia.

He added that legal study group formed by the government to go over the new draft proposal for ancestral domain is just about to finish its task.

“Soon we will submit to Malaysia our response to the MILF’s latest proposal,” said Garcia, a former general in the Armed Forces who fought Moro rebels in Mindanao.

For his part, Mohagher Iqbal, MILF peace panel chairman, said he did not see Libya assuming the IMT lead immediately.

“Acceptable to the MILF or not, the two peace panels have to meet and resume the talks. In the event of the resumption of the peace talks, it is the issue of the ancestral domain that must be discussed, not the IMT concerns,” Iqbal told reporters in a text message, referring to Libya’s expressed readiness to lead the IMT.

No war despite pullout

Meanwhile, Malacañang said that there would be no fresh fighting between the government and the MILF despite the pullout of the Malaysian IMT contingent.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita and Presidential Adviser for the Peace Process Jesus Dureza, in separate interviews with The STAR, said Malaysia has committed to be the facilitator of the talks between the government and the MILF.

“There is no truth or basis to reports or fears that there would be an escalation of fighting as reported in the media because of the withdrawal (of Malaysian monitors),” Dureza said over the phone after meeting with local executives and military officials in Cotabato City to assess the implications of the reduced number of IMT members.

He said he would be visiting other areas to meet with local officials in connection with the precarious state of the peace talks.

He invited journalists to visit areas where violence is feared to erupt to see for themselves that “both sides are friendly with each other.”

Dureza said the joint ceasefire committee of the government and the MILF will take up whatever slack will be left by the departure of the Malaysians.

When asked about reports that the MILF is already preparing for war, he said he doubts whether that would be the official position of the group.

“There are some apprehensions but we will not squander the gains of the peace process by these kinds of talk,” Dureza said.

Peace talks are currently stalled on the stage of hammering out an agreement on ancestral domain or determining the boundaries of a new autonomous region.

The MILF accused the government of reneging on agreed “consensus points” but Palace officials said the government cannot compromise the Constitution on any agreement on ancestral domain.

Dureza said there is no definite date yet on the resumption of the formal talks but informal discussions between the two sides are continuous. – With Paolo Romero