GPH-MILF agreement leaves Lumads wary of being left out once more
By Karlon N. Rama
The peace panels representing the Philippine Government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), in an event eclipsed by developments in the Scarborough Shoal, have signed a 10-point document that many hope would finally lead to a peace agreement between the two.
The document, signed in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia last April 24, intends to “further guide discussions on the substantive agenda of the negotiations” and has been met with varying reactions. Judge Soliman Santos, an author and peace advocate, calls it “a bit quaint or crudely formulated.”
“The document is definitively a positive step forward but it is also indicative that there is really still a long way to go,” Santos, who wrote such books as The Moro Islamic Challenge: Constitutional Rethinking for the Mindanao Peace Process, said in a statement.
But the Kuala Lumpur Accord has made anxious three of seven Lumad or indigenous communities living in ancestral lands that comprise 55 of the 81 towns in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) province of Maguindanao and the Region 12 territories of Sultan Kudarat, North and South Cotabato and Sarangani.