Philippine Muslims hope new law will bring peace

SULTAN KUDARAT: Members or supporters of the Philippines’ largest Muslim rebel group gathered in their tens of thousands yesterday to discuss a landmark law granting them autonomy, with one expressing hope it would make their “dream of peace” a reality.

President Rodrigo Duterte last week signed the law, a key step to ending a Muslim rebellion in the south of mainly Catholic Philippines that had claimed about 150,000 lives since the 1970s.

Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) members, supporters and residents from Mindanao island, including women and fighters carrying arms, trooped to the main MILF camp there for a consultation.

Their leaders were seeking support for the law ahead of a referendum on the measure, which created an expanded autonomous region and was aimed at ending one of Asia’s longest and deadliest conflicts.

“This is our dream. If we end this (fighting), hopefully we can live in peace,” veteran rebel fighter Nasser Samama, 61, said.

Muslim rebels had long battled for independence or autonomy in Mindanao, which they regard as their ancestral homeland.

The law aimed to enforce a 2014 peace deal under which MILF vowed to give up its quest for independence and lay down the weapons of its 30,000 fighters in return for self-rule.

Under the law, a new political entity, known as the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, would replace the current autonomous region created following a 1996 deal with another rebel group, the Moro National Liberation Front.