Philippine rebel chief says Muslims must shape fate
Tue 31 May 2005
By Manny Mogato
DARAPANAN, Philippines, May 31 (Reuters) - The leader of the largest Islamic rebel group in the Philippines said on Tuesday that Muslims in the mainly Roman Catholic country must decide on the shape of an ancestral homeland as a peace deal nears.
A referendum in Muslim-dominated areas of the south should be part of the consultation process, Ebrahim Murad, chairman of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), told a news conference at a rebel base on Mindanao island.
"In the past, the dosage of peace has been prescribed by outsiders," he said as the MILF leadership wrapped up a rare three-day summit to canvass the views of an estimated 500,000 members and supporters.
Muslims in the southern Philippines, Murad said, "must take the lead in shaping their destiny in finding the real, lasting and acceptable solution to the centuries-old Mindanao problem".
The MILF and government have hailed a recent series of talks as a breakthrough in efforts to end a three-decade separatist conflict that has killed at least 120,000 people and soured the overall investment climate in the Philippines.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo also faces threats from communist guerrillas and other Muslim rebel groups, but signing a peace deal with the MILF and its 12,000 fighters would be a major step in improving security and attracting business.
Still, the critical issues of ancestral land for Muslims and mineral rights make a speedy agreement unlikely.
Although the government and the MILF have not discussed the question of governance, Murad said they had begun studying the experiences of East Timor, Sudan, Bosnia and other countries as models of conflict resolution.
Murad, 57, who rose to chairman two years ago with the death of MILF founder Salamat Hashim, sounded optimistic about the progress of negotiations brokered by Malaysia since 2001.
"The MILF and government are in the final stretch of their peace talks," he said, adding that discussions last month on ancestral land were "very encouraging".
But Silvestre Afable Jr, the government's chief peace negotiator, tried to tone down the high levels of optimism that emerged from the MILF summit.
"We are going through the crucial area of negotiations," he told reporters. "We are not yet at the stage of real difficult issues on the matter of governance."
Afable, also Arroyo's communications director, reiterated her government's position that it was not ready to surrender any part of the state's sovereignty to rebels but said the MILF was showing sincerity in the peace process.
"We want independence," Abdullah, a farmer loading his bag and bundles of firewood onto a truck, told Reuters. "We want our own land, our own government, our own system."
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