TIME IS RUNNING OUT! SIGN THE PEACE AGREEMENT NOW! CSO STATEMENT Urgency for Peace in Mindanao: Sign and Implement the Comprehensive Peace Agreement Now! For the negotiators to bring home a breakthrough for the Bangsamoro! We, representatives of civil society organizations, reaffirming our commitment to and imbibing the hope for peace in Mindanao, gathered to reflect on the urgent issues affecting the negotiations between government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), and to discern what can be done in earnest to keep alive the hopes for lasting peace. We note that more than eight months have passed since the country witnessed the euphoria of the signing of the landmark Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB) that laid down the principles and roadmap to resolve the decades of rebellion in Mindanao. The FAB, plus four Annexes dealing on the details of wealth-sharing, power-sharing, transitional modalities, and normalization, comprise the comprehensive agreement. So far, only the Annex for transitional modalities has been done. Based on their original timeframe, the parties should have concluded a comprehensive pact end of December 2012. We are therefore alarmed at the six-month delay. We are concerned that if crucial time is allowed to further tick away without anything happening at the negotiating table, the viability of the peace roadmap may be called into question. This delay has already stymied the substantive work of the Transition Commission (TransCom) in drafting the Bangsamoro Basic Law and identifying possible processes for the legalization of the upcoming political settlement. At the very least, the Annexes on wealth-sharing and power-sharing should guide the TransCom’s work. We understand the difficulties facing the government and MILF negotiators in building consensus given the nature of the remaining issues they grappled with. Even then, we note how hard work and creativity led them to agree on the transitional modalities, and achieve preliminary consensus on wealth-sharing. True to their roles, negotiators can always engage in hard bargaining. But we also ask that they be willing to offer and accept a workable and dignified compromise. This may be one way to hurdle past the impasse. In this spirit, we bid the negotiators goodwill on their exploratory meeting starting July 8. They will always have our all-out support as they take on the decision tasks in the days ahead. Recognizing their strong sense of urgency to achieve peace, we expect them to bring home a breakthrough for the Bangsamoro through the singed Annexes. We are confident that the honourable men and women of the government and MILF peace panels will always live up to the hope for lasting peace in Mindanao. We call on President Benigno Aquino III and MILF Chair Murad Ebrahim, Al Hadj, to reassure the general public that they continue to stand strong behind the peace process by seeing through the immediate signing of a comprehensive agreement. That is the best antidote to calm the stirrings of restiveness and bring sobriety to the communities. We also call on President Aquino, who has declared bringing peace in Mindanao to be one of his legacies, to use the ongoing peace negotiation as an occasion to examine flexibilities in the bureaucratic process of the national government so that the critical mechanisms that will be embodied in an upcoming political settlement can also be accommodated. We further call on President Aquino to mobilize the entire government to inform the country about the nitty-gritty of the peace process. We urge the local leaders, the religious communities, and the business sector, to help their respective constituencies understand the peace process and its historic significance for Mindanao by spearheading public information drives about it. We also urge the news media to report about the peace process and the Moro conflict with utmost regard for conflict-sensitivity, and factual and contextual accuracy. We ask colleagues in civil society to consolidate ourselves into the common platform for public advocacy effort on the peace talks, and use our respective networks to gather the perspective of as many communities as possible and bring these to the formal process. We will continue to journey with government and the MILF to ensure that an upcoming political settlement attains wide public support, and the process of entrenching the Bangsamoro entity is sensitive to the sentiments of grassroots communities. Fueled with this desire and resolve, we commit ourselves to the noble task of helping build lasting peace in Mindanao. Done this 4th day of July 2013, at Apo View Hotel, Davao City.
Posted on: Sat, 06 Jul 2013 07:34:08 +0000
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