PRESIDENT Arroyo endorsed last July 22 the request of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and the appeal of some peace groups to postpone the regional election of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao set on August 11. Congress is the only body that can postpone elections. Despite his earlier opposition to clamors for the postponement of the ARMM election, House Speaker Prospero Nograle will rally the House majority behind the President. The latest report (www.philstar.com./July 25):

“Five Mindanao congressmen led by Lanao del Sur Rep. Faysah Dumarpa and Maguindanao Rep. Simeon Datumanong took the initiative and filed House bill 4832 yesterday proposing to synchronize the ARMM polls with the 2010 elections.” President Arroyo, Malacañang said, will certify the bill. Will HB 4832 pass into law like walking in the park?

Road Blocks

They have less than two weeks after Arroyo’s State of the Nation Address on Monday to pass the bill. The Senate will wield the road block. As of July 24, a bipartisan majority in the Senate led by Senate President Manuel Villar was opposing the postponement.

In the House, the opposition may not be strong enough to kill the bill. Rep. Teodoro Locsin Jr. of Makati City, to whose committee (suffrage and election reforms) the bill will be submitted for sponsorship in the plenary session, “will not sponsor it” but instead “fight it”. His fueling of the anti-Muslim bias can catch fire.

Commission on Elections Chairman Jose Melo is against the postponement but if Congress could pass the law before August 11, the Commission has to abide. If the discussions among the e-group Kusog Mindanaw are a valid gauge, Muslim professionals are divided; and so are some other sectors as reported by media.

In Aid of Peace Process

Whatever happens to HB 4232, the momentous question is: Why postpone the ARMM election?

If congressional hearings are in aid of legislation, the postponement of the ARMM election is in aid of the peace process. Here’s the gist: The election is considered an obstacle to the peace process and postponement will hasten the GRP-MILF peace negotiation. How? It’s unclear.

The MILF asked for the postponement last July 17 citing two reasons (Luwaran, July 18):

Pushing through with the election would create the impressions that the government is not really serious in the present talks and President Arroyo is not really determined to wind up the talks during her term of office.

It will postpone the start of the transition period of the future Bangsamoro Juridical Entity (BJE) once the government and the MILF sign the Comprehensive Compact because elected officials of the ARMM will have to finish first their term of office in 2011.

Are the ARMM election and the GRP-MILF negotiation – thus the peace process – that consequentially related? How they are connected is mind-boggling.

The government, through Press Secretary Jesus Dureza and Presidential Adviser for the Peace process Hermogenes Esperon Jr. are vaguer (www.philstar.com, July 23): “the move would allow the forging of a peace pact at the soonest possible time.” This will spur both sides to work faster on the peace process and show the “sincerity and goodwill” on both sides.

Citing the MILF, the MNLF and local officials, Esperon said the ARMM elections would be a “stumbling block” to the early resolution of the peace process. How?

If the elections were held as scheduled, the elected ARMM officials will get a three-year term; if postponed, they will stay in office in holdover capacity until the elections are held after the signing of a final agreement with the MILF – elections that will be according to the provisions of the final peace agreement with the MILF, not according to RA 9054 amending RA 6754.

Belaboring in double-talk and rhetoric, the two officials separately said:

Dureza: “There are strategic developments in the peace process that need to be given a chance to succeed. (Deferment of the election is) a consensus reached by the Cabinet, the (negotiating) panels and stakeholders.”

Esperon: The government was not exactly bending backward, giving in to the MILF, since the deferment would “benefit the government, the people in Mindanao and the entire country. We are just giving the peace process the chance it needs to go forward at a faster pace. It is also an incentive to the MILF and MNLF. The stakeholders proposed a postponement and the government accommodated the request.”

What double-talk! The government did not give in, did not bend backwards; it only accommodated the request.

Who’s Fooling Who?

Is the postponement really in aid of the peace process? The presumption is that the peace process is intertwined not only with the ARMM election but necessarily with the ARMM. Let’s filter truth behind the belaboring, the double-talk, and the vague rhetoric.

Now, I’m wondering: Is “deference to the GRP-MILF peace process” President Arroyo’s real motive in endorsing the postponement? Dureza made another pitch (MindaNews, July 23): “… she wants to ‘leave a lasting legacy of peace in Mindanao’.” That’s double-talk — self-interest disguised in noble intention.

The political opposition, in the same MindaNews story, sees it differently – as “the first step in a grand scheme to amend the Constitution … to allow (Arroyo) to stay in power.” This may be “ridiculous” as National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales has put it; but with the grand lies Arroyo and her top aides are notorious of, the speculation is not groundless.

Back to the main issues: Is election an obstacle to the peace process? Will postponement hasten the GRP-MILF peace negotiation? The eleven years of off-and-on GRP-MILF negotiations starting January 1997 have the answers. However, let’s just examine the seven years by the Arroyo government since March 2001.

The GRP-MILF peace negotiation has three aspects: (a) security; (b) rehabilitation; and, (c) ancestral domain, as agreed in Tripoli, Libya on June 22, 2001with Jesus G. Dureza (GRP) and Al Haj Murad Ebrahim (MILF) as signatories and Saif Al Islam Gaddafi as witness.

On May 6 and May 7, 2002, the memorandums of agreements (interim agreements) on the first two aspects were signed and since then implemented. The negotiation took less than one year. The November 2001 ARMM election was within the negotiating period – June 2001 – May 2002. Yet, this was not postponed.

Dureza, Esperon and the other advocates of postponement will argue that ancestral domain is different. It is. Let’s take up the difference later. Meantime, let’s not pass up disturbing questions:

Talks on ancestral domain started in December 2004. There was a long “off” between May 7, 2002 and December 2004. What a manifestation of seriousness and sincerity for the two Parties! Why was the ARMM election of August 8, 2005 not postponed to “spur both sides to work faster” and show the “sincerity and goodwill” of both sides?

Ah! At that time, the ARMM election was not a “stumbling block”. Now it is! What a puzzle!

Dureza, Esperon and the other advocates of postponement will protest that “that time” and “this time” are different. Then, there was no agreement yet on ancestral domain; now there is.

Yes, there is. But December 2004 and July 16, 2008 when both panels settled all contentious issues was three years and seven months. That was between two ARMM elections. Certainly, neither the ARMM nor its election caused the GRP and MILF negotiators to take that long to reach an agreement.

The two negotiating panels held their 16th exploratory talks in Kuala Lumpur, July 24-25, “to integrate all the consensus points on the four strands of ancestral domain” (www.luwaran, July 23), to initial the final draft MOA-AD, and to schedule the signing ceremony next month. We see, indeed, the difference. But why is the election a stumbling block to a finished agreement?

Dureza, Esperon and the other advocates of postponement will clarify: Not a stumbling block to the signing of the final draft but to entrenchment of the BJE, hence impeding “the early resolution of the peace process”. Will the signing next month not resolve the peace process?

Not yet. The signing of the MOA-AD next month – if “no more hard bargaining” stalled the integration of “all the consensus points” and neither Malacañang nor the MILF Central Committee will veto the final draft – is only half-way the final resolution of the peace process.

[Flash: The latest disheartening report (MindaNews, July 26): The 16th exploratory talks ended in another impasse bidding “Goodbye” to the signing of the MOA-AD set on August 5. GRP panel vice chair Prof. Rudy Rodil said “There were disagreements during the process of the final drafting” of the MOA. MILF panel chair Mohagher Iqbal said the “GRP (was) undoing major settled issues”. When the two panels will meet again, the report made no mention.]

Will the postponement of the August 11 ARMM election hasten the process? That is a fallacy.

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