The Mamasapano massacre, the Philippines’ 9/11, stalls the precarious peace process on the island of Mindanao.
After 120,000 casualties and millions of evacuees, peace seemed close at hand in the southern Philippines. Years of negotiations had finally led to an agreement granting some amount of autonomy to the Muslim community, a minority in the primarily Catholic archipelago albeit a majority in the southern regions.
Exhausted by decades of conflict, everyone seemed ready for the accord, including the president and the main guerrilla group. Parliamentary approval, expected shortly, was a foregone conclusion. But this was before the massacre in Mamasapano of the Fallen 44, members of an elite national police force that were ambushed by rebels.
President Benigno Aquino, approaching the last year of his term and still very much in favour with his people, is now on the defensive. He has staked much of his political reputation on the peace process with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the most numerous rebel group on the island of Mindanao, essentially granting them self-government of the region of A Bangsamoro that is considered an ancestral site by Filipino Muslims.
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The Mamasapano massacre, the Philippines’ 9/11, stalls the precarious peace process on the island of Mindanao.
