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ZAMBOANGA CITY: The government on Friday has doubled its rewards for
the capture of two notorious leaders of the rebel group Moro Islamic
Liberation Front (MILF), which is negotiating peace with Manila.
Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno said they have
raised the bounties to P20 million for the capture of Umbra Kato and
Abdurahman Macapaar, who allegedly led hundreds of rebels in a
series of deadly attacks in Mindanao last month.
Manila had previously offered P10 million reward
for the capture of the two rebel leaders, as President Gloria Arroyo
ordered police and military forces to pursue the two said to
responsible for the brutal killings of dozens of innocent civilians
in North Cotabato and Lanao del Norte provinces.
The MILF said the bounties put up by the
government would only complicate the already tense situation and the
peace talks in Mindanao.
Arroyo earlier dissolved the government panel
negotiating peace with the MILF and scrapped a territorial deal
between government and rebel peace negotiators after the Supreme
Court stopped the formal signing of the said accord that would have
granted Muslims their own homeland in more than 700 villages across
Mindanao.
“The bounty offered by the Philippine
government for the capture of Kato and Macapaar will only make
things worse in Mindanao. It will not help resolve the problems in
Mindanao, not even the peace process,” Eid Kabalu, a senior rebel
leader, told The Manila Times.
Manila repeatedly demanded the MILF to
peacefully surrender Kato and Macapaar. The MILF said it would not
yield the two rebel leaders, saying, it would investigate their
alleged involvements in the attacks, which occurred after the
aborted signing of the ancestral domain deal.
Mohagher Iqbal, the chief MILF peace negotiator,
blamed hawkish factions in the Arroyo government and politicians
opposed to the homeland deal for the failed peace talks.
Manila said Arroyo was not aware of the
provisions of the ancestral domain deal initially signed by the
peace negotiators on July 27 in Malaysia, which is brokering the
peace talks.
But Iqbal said the President knew about the
ancestral domain deal long before it was initially signed in Kuala
Lumpur because the issue had been tackled many times since last year
by the Cluster E. “The President knew everything about the
ancestral domain agreement and other important developments as far
as the peace talks were concerned. President Arroyo had been
informed about everything that had anything to do with the peace
process,” Iqbal said.
“They also wanted us to sign the peace
agreement, but we declined because there are more important things
to talk about as far as the Mindanao problems were concerned.”
“The memorandum of agreement on the ancestral
domain had been tackled many times since last year with the Cluster
E and as a matter of fact they rushed the signing of the ancestral
domain deal because President Arroyo wanted it included in her state
of the nation address on July 28,” Iqbal said.
Cluster E refers to the Cabinet Cluster for
Political and Security Affairs that routinely advised Arroyo on
national security matters. Its members included the National
Security Council, National Defense, Foreign Affairs, Justice and
Finance secretaries.
Iqbal said the ancestral domain deal was
considered final. “It has been initialed already and the
memorandum of agreement on the ancestral domain deal, as what we
have repeatedly said in the past, is a done deal. We will not
negotiate anymore what has been already agreed by the peace
panels,” he said, adding, the peace talks are now in
“purgatory.”
-- Al Jacinto
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