By Xinhua,
Manila : Philippine presidential adviser on the peace process Hermogenes Esperon Jr. on Sunday said the government is not compromising the Philippine sovereignty and territorial integrity in pushing for a landmark deal with the country’s largest Muslim rebel group — Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
The government and rebel negotiators are expected to sign a Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) in Malaysia Tuesday to expand the current six-province Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) in the South and to grant it more political and economic powers.
The new autonomous region, named Bangasamoro homeland, is supposedly to have its own basic laws, its own police and internal security force and its own system of banking and finance, civil service, education and legislative and electoral system, among others for over 4 million Muslims in the region.
Earlier reports said that under the MoA, “a defined territory” and “system of governance suitable and acceptable to the Bangasamoro as a distinct dominant people” will be established.
“Even if we accede territory to the new ARMM or the Bangsamoro Juridical Entity, the generic name, we are not giving away sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Philippines,” Esperontold reporters.
“There is nothing wrong giving the Bangsamoro homeland its own security force,” he said, adding that this was actually given in the peace agreement signed by the government with MILF’s predecessor the Moro National Liberation Front (MILF) in 1996.
Under the proposed agreement, a plebiscite would be held if over 700 villages would be included in the Bangsamoro homeland, Esperon said.
Meanwhile, MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu told local media that the group is ready to sign the agreement after almost ten years of negotiations with the government for a final peace agreement.
The 12,000-member MILF has been launching a bloody guerilla war since 1978 to strive for an independent Muslim in the southern Mindanao region. Local reports said that the more than three decades of rebellion has claimed over 120,000 people’s lives.