Every time preparations for another round of peace talks with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) are being made, everyone is filled with hope that this time peace will finally be realized. This was so in the past, and so it is until now.
However, when the peace talks are about to begin, some kind of a hitch would suddenly crop up here and there. Eventually demands and preconditions which the government, sooner or later, finds quite impossible to meet or work on, are set, followed by a series of meetings and discussions that almost always end nowhere. This has been the pattern of peace negotiations in the past.
Having the MILF in peace talks is always a welcome development for us Mindanaoans. This raises our hope that the parties to the negotiations would come up with solutions satisfactory to all sides, but within the framework of the Constitution and existing laws.
Secession from the Philippines should be out of the question. Most Mindanaoans do not want this solution. They would rather have the territorial integrity of the country preserved.
Besides, the MILF does not speak for the whole of Mindanao. Neither can it claim that it alone has the ancestral rights over the lands in question. The fact is, other ethnic groups have also been on these lands long before the present settlers came. Like the lumad.
The search for peace is not a game. The MILF and its leaders should bear in mind that peace is a serious matter, that it will spell the difference between a bright and bleak future for the people of Mindanao and their children, and that it will determine whether or not the coming generations of Mindanaoans will enjoy peace, progress and stability, as those living now dream.
It’s high time that the MILF accepted the fact that peaceful co-existence with other cultures can bring about progress, something that has escaped this part of the country for decades.
—GLEN S. SUBANO,
glensubano@yahoo.com