The Philippine army is preparing for the worst outcome as the government and the country's largest rebel group were halted from signing a key agreement that would pave the way to cease nearly four decades of bloodshed in the southern region of Mindanao, a military spokesman said Tuesday.
Public affairs office chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) Lt. Col. Ernesto Torres said army chief Alexander Yano has directed military commanders to continuously monitor the developments in Central Mindanao and some parts of Eastern Mindanao and to continuously plan for contingencies and also to take appropriate action.
The Philippine government Monday canceled a scheduled signing of the agreement of ancestral domain with the 12,000-member Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) after the Supreme Court issued a temporary restraining order.
The court order, considered a setback in the almost ten-year peace talk, came after thousands of local residents, organized by local officials and Catholic priests, in the Philippines' southern city of Zamboanga staged street protest to denounce the agreement.
The 12,000-member MILF has been waging a bloody rebellion there for self-determination since 1978. A significant number of lives had been taken in MILF's sporadic guerrilla wars against the government.
Torres said that if the MILF resorts to violent actions to protest the issuance of the TRO, the military is "confident that we are more than capable and ready to address any threat situation in the area that may arise as a result of the ongoing peace negotiation."
Torres said the military has "sufficient troops" all over Mindanao.
Meanwhile, MILF vice chairman for political affairs Ghadzali Jaafar said they expect the government to abide by the provisions of the document following the initialing of the draft agreement on July 27 in Kuala Lumpur.
"Our position is that after initialing, both parties initialed the Memorandum of Agreement, that is a signing," said Jaafar, adding that what was planned to be held Tuesday was merely "ceremonial and formality" to publicly announce an agreement has been already forged.
The MILF official called the Supreme Court' decision was a product of the government's internal problem.
"We have initialed the text of the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral domain last July 27, 2008. The pact is a done deal. It is binding on the contracting parties who are obliged to refrain from acts that would defeat the object and purpose of their agreement," MILF said in a statement posted on its website.
Source:Xinhua
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