PRESIDENTIAL Adviser on the Peace Process Jesus G. Dureza on Thursday welcomed as “positive” the convergence of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in putting closure to the Mindanao conflict.
The MILF and the largest of three MNLF factions, led by former Cotabato City Mayor Muslimin Sema, had twice forged in recent months a deal binding both camps to find a common solution to the now 45-year Moro rebellion.
Sema’s group has more than 20 “revolutionary states” scattered across the country’s south and in all of the five component provinces of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).
“There is an apparent convergence and inclusivity now in each other’s peace-building initiatives. This is what we want, a peace process involving all stakeholders,” Dureza said on Thursday at the sidelines of his breakfast meeting with MILF Chairman Hadji Murad Ebrahim.
The two-hour meeting was held at Camp Darapanan, the MILF’s main enclave at the northwest of Sultan Kudarat town in Maguindanao. It was the first official engagement between the MILF and Malacañang under President Duterte.
They talked about the prospects of the peace process under the Duterte administration and agreed to resume with all bilateral initiatives complementing all agreements between the MILF and Malacañang, stalled by the recent synchronized local and national elections.
Dureza said he found beneficial to the peace process the agreement of the MILF and the MNLF-Sema group to a common formula for lasting peace in the south.
The MILF and the MNLF-Sema group had earlier said, in bilateral press communiqués, their initiatives are meant to synchronize each other’s concepts on how to best address the Mindanao Moro issue.