DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 25 December) — When we hear the words, “love story,” we immediately think about love between a man and a woman. However, the love that will be told here would be one between brothers and sisters in arms, who fought alongside each other against oppression and injustice, and for hope of a new world where Muslims, Christians, and Indigenous people, would live in peace and equitable governance.
The Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) have a shared history in establishing the Bangsamoro region. Formerly known as the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) has since then replaced it with a system built upon the principles of moral governance and greater fiscal autonomy and strong international support.
Despite parting ways more than five decades ago, both Fronts now serve within the same region, rebuilding lives and ushering a new era of progress that Bangsamoros are set to experience. The MILF and the MNLF took different paths and timelines to get to where they are now, but the intention and the cause remained embedded in the hearts of their combatants, members, and communities: that of championing equality, fighting against discrimination, and modeling leadership where the Bangsamoro people are the eventual winners.
With the likelihood of the first BARMM Parliamentary elections being moved to 2026, a year later than scheduled, herein lies yet another test to this sacred bond between brothers and sisters. Will the political track and party campaigns reignite the partisan and factionalism agenda that drove a wedge between the two Fronts, or will it strengthen the unity and solidarity in having to overcome a common hurdle together to protect the autonomy both Fronts sacrificed and worked so hard for?
In every love story, there is usually a period where each of the main characters would go on their own path to self-discovery, and only when they truly find themselves that they are ready to finally meet each other again and reunite to make things work. It may have taken more than 50 years, but we are finally at a crossroads of lasting peace, and we now have a choice to embrace each other to work towards a future united as One Bangsamoro.
The love between the MNLF and the MILF will forever be etched in every oath they have taken to offer their lives for Allah SWT. The landscape may have changed, from battlegrounds to voting precincts, but the fight for truth and justice remain. And if we make it to the end with people’s lives uplifted, economies developed, poverty alleviated, and our children educated, this may be the greatest love story that will truly have its happily ever after.
(MindaViews is the opinion section of MindaNews. Nur-Ainee Tan Lim is the Head Secretariat and Chair of the Socio-economic Subcommittee of the GPH-MNLF Peace Implementing Committee. She is currently the Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Social Services and Development in the BARMM. She is the daughter of MNLF founding Chairman Nur Misuari and Bangsamoro Martyr Desdemona Abubakar Tan)