Archive for August, 2001
By Carlos H. Conde
Cyberdyaryo
Published: Aug. 28, 2001
DAVAO CITY - Malacanang should create an independent fact-finding body to investigate the allegation that some elements within the armed forces have been colluding with the Abu Sayyaf. The creation of such a body, the proponents say, should settle the issue of partiality and grandstanding that bedevil the investigations being conducted by separate committees of both houses of Congress.
Fr. Eliseo Mercado Jr. OMI, a leading Mindanao peace advocate, thinks that the independent body similar to the Davide Commission that investigated the series of coup attempts by renegade soldiers in the ’80s would be “the best thing” to get to the bottom of the story.
“It’s high time to get a Davide-type commission to look into this plague (alleged collusion),” the priest said.
Continue reading »
Posted on August 28, 2001, and filed under CyberDyaryo, Stories |
By Carlos H. Conde
Cyberdyaryo
Published: Aug. 15, 2001
DAVAO CITY–Somewhere in Jolo, Nur Misuari is reportedly sulking. For good reason.
Last week, Malacanang stripped him of the chairmanship of the Southern Philippines Council for Peace and Development, the de facto governing body over the 14 cities and 15 provinces that comprise the Special Zone of Peace and Development (Szopad), itself a de facto political unit.
Immediately after his firing (”unceremoniously,” say Misuari’s people in the Moro National Liberation Front), there was talk that Misuari would give up his last political card � the governorship of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).
Continue reading »
Posted on August 15, 2001, and filed under CyberDyaryo, Stories |
By Carlos H. Conde
Cyberdyaryo
Published: Aug. 14, 2001
WHEN voters from the four provinces of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) troop to the polls today for a referendum on the fate of the New ARMM Organic Act (Republic Act 9054), they will be deciding on a law that violates the letter and spirit of the 1996 Final Peace Agreement signed by the government and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF).
Moreover, the ARMM constituents will be deciding on a law that is a product of indifference, ignorance and political manipulation in Congress, even among Moro congressmen.
The referendum today — which will ask ARMM residents, as well as residents of the 11 provinces and 14 cities that are not within the non-ARMM but are within the Special Zone of Peace and Development (Szopad), if they agree to RA 9054 that amended the original organic act (RA 6734) — is, thus, an exercise in futility that has far-reaching implications on peace in Mindanao.
Continue reading »
Posted on August 14, 2001, and filed under CyberDyaryo, Stories |
