By CAROLYN O. ARGUILLAS, MindaNews
DARAPANAN, Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao – The victory of the President’s party in last week’s elections is victory for the peace process, Al Haj Murad Ebrahim, chair of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) said.
“We’re quite happy that in the results of the election in both local and national level, the administration candidates dominated. So I think there will be no reason for the government not to push through with the processes in the negotiation when they have… majority (in) Congress,” Murad told MindaNews Friday afternoon at the reception hall of the Office of the MILF Peace Panel.
He said they hope the victory of the Liberal Party, the President’s party, “will be an advantage because we are relying much on the sincerity and the capability of the government to implement the (peace) process.”
Murad also said the MILF will start building a political party “within this year” in preparation for the 2016 elections when the first set of officials of the Bangsamoro is expected to be elected.
“Within this year, we will start already (setting up the political party).” Murad said in mixed English and Pilipino.
Murad said they will form a political party because “we want to maintain the status of the MILF as an Islamic organization and the political party will be the arm of the MILF for the political process.”
Murad said they have yet to name the party but it will definitely contain the word “Bangsamoro.”
The Philippine government (GPH) and MILF peace panels signed on October 15 last year the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB). After the elections, they are supposed to complete the annexes on Wealth-sharing, Power-sharing and Normalization, to complete the comprehensive peace pact for the establishment of the Bangsamoro, the new autonomous political entity that would replace the 23-year old Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).
The FAB also provides for the creation of a Transition Commission that would draft the Bangsamoro Basic Law.