CAGAYAN DE ORO (MindaNews / 02 April) — Twelve years ago, the Government of the Philippines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front signed the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro at Malacañang Palace — a historic accord born of nearly two decades of painstaking negotiations facilitated by Malaysia, supported by the international community, and sustained by the courage of peace advocates on both sides.
As co-chair of the Joint Normalization Committee, I mark this anniversary with a clear-eyed view: there can never be a perfect agreement, much less a perfect process of implementing one. The CAB was a product of long, difficult, and deeply human negotiations — each provision reflecting hard-won compromises among parties with competing aspirations.
Complexity is not a defect of this peace process; it is in its very DNA. Over 12 years, we have navigated changes in national administrations, legal challenges including the Supreme Court ruling on Sulu, repeated postponements of the first Bangsamoro parliamentary elections originally scheduled for 2022, and the delicate work of translating a written agreement into tangible change on the ground.
Yet even amid this complexity, the political track moves forward: on March 25, President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. signed into law Republic Act No. 12317, setting the first-ever Bangsamoro parliamentary elections on the second Monday of
September 2026 — a decisive act of fulfillment by the Government of the Philippines of its commitment under the CAB to establish a duly elected Bangsamoro government.
None of the complexities we have endured should surprise us. What should concern us is if we allow them to become an excuse for inaction or, worse, for abandoning the shared commitments that brought us this far.
We must be honest about the serious challenges that have tested this process. The decision of the MILF Peace Implementing Panel in July 2025 to defer the fourth and final phase of decommissioning — involving some 14,000 combatants and 2,450 weapons — was a painful setback, resulting in the return of over ₱788 million in earmarked government funds to the national treasury and leaving thousands of willing combatants unable to transition to civilian life.
Heightened localized armed confrontations, including clan feuds, political violence, and intra-group clashes, have displaced families and entire communities across the Bangsamoro, with OCHA reporting around 125,000 displaced persons across Mindanao as of early 2025, the majority in the BARMM region.
These realities disrupt the very peace that the CAB signing promised. The temporary suspension of substantive peace engagements by the MILF in March 2026, the unresolved questions surrounding transitional justice and reconciliation, and the proliferation of loose firearms in affected areas — all of these represent the heavy cost of delayed implementation.
Each displaced family, each postponed decommissioning, each escalation of violence on the ground is a reminder that the promise of the CAB remains unfulfilled for those who need it most.
Yet it would be a disservice to the thousands who have staked their lives on this peace process to speak only of its limitations.
Over more than six years of normalization implementation, the gains are real and consequential. Some 26,145 MILF combatants — roughly 65 percent of the total force — have been decommissioned in three completed phases since 2015. Each of them received ₱100,000 in transitional cash assistance, and all have been enrolled in PhilHealth. More than 60 percent have secured civil registration — birth certificates that, for the first time, grant them legal identity and access to public services. Over 30 percent have undergone skills training and emergency employment through TESDA and partner agencies. The educational assistance program, now valued at ₱715.6 million, will be able to support 13,600 thousand children and dependents of decommissioned combatants.
On the transformation of six acknowledged MILF camps, some ₱4 billion worth of development projects — farm-to-market roads, bridges, rural health facilities, water systems, and solar lighting — have been implemented through the Inter-Cabinet Cluster Mechanism on Normalization, the World Bank-managed Bangsamoro Normalization Trust Fund, and international partners including the European Union, Government of Japan and Australia.
Equally significant is the development and continuing implementation of the Small Arms and Light Weapons Management Program, a critical initiative spearheaded by the JNC in partnership with the UNDP through the ASPIRE Project. The program is now being rolled out through the Localizing Normalization Implementation initiative with provincial local government units gaining momentum down to the municipal level.
The SALW program—which has already facilitated the voluntary turn-in of hundreds of firearms across Basilan, Tawi-Tawi, Lanao del Sur and Maguindanao , with livelihood assistance provided to those who turned in their weapons—is designed to protect communities from the armed violence that threatens the peace we are building. It is an essential complement to the decommissioning process, addressing the broader reality that community security requires not only the laying down of arms by former combatants and common citizens but the reduction and responsible management of loose firearms and the effective control of the movement of weapons in the communities.
The inscription of the Bangsamoro Peace Agreements in the UNESCO National Memory of the World Register of the Philippines in 2026 is itself a recognition that this process, with all its imperfections, stands as a landmark achievement in Philippine history and in global peacebuilding.
Let this anniversary be more than a commemoration — let it be a reckoning, a recommitment and self-examination.
I make three urgent calls to action. First, to both parties and all stakeholders: we need patience and a far greater effort to collaborate than to accuse. The trust painstakingly built over decades of negotiation is our most precious and most fragile asset. Every public accusation, every unilateral action, every political maneuver that bypasses the bilateral mechanisms enshrined in the CAB erodes that trust. Complexity is not the enemy—it is the terrain we must navigate together, with discipline and good faith. Let us return to the principles of jointness, bilateralism, and mutuality that are the very foundation of this agreement.
Second, the normalization process must be fully insulated from the political dynamics that have repeatedly added layers of complexity to implementation. The decommissioning of combatants, the delivery of socioeconomic packages, the transformation of camps, the management of small arms and light weapons, and the pursuit of transitional justice cannot be held hostage to electoral timelines, leadership changes, or partisan interests. These are commitments to real people — families who dared to hope, communities that chose peace over war.
With the signing of Republic Act No. 12317, the Government of the Philippines has delivered on its end of the political track. The path to a duly elected Bangsamoro Parliament is now set in law. As the MILF and all political forces in the Bangsamoro prepare to fully participate in this historic democratic exercise, it is my earnest hope that this moment of fulfillment will also inspire the resumption of the normalization commitments that walk hand in hand with the political track — so that the Bangsamoro people may witness not only the election of their first parliament, but also the completion of the decommissioning process that will truly mark the end of armed struggle and the beginning of a fully transformed Bangsamoro.
I call upon the GPH, the MILF, the BARMM leadership, the international community, and every Filipino who believes in the promise of peace: protect what has been built, address what remains undone, and honor the sacrifices of those who walked this road before us.
Third, this anniversary is an occasion for those of us who identify as peace advocates, peace workers, and peacebuilders to examine our own choices.
In the complexity of implementing a peace agreement, it is always easier to accuse than to analyze, to attack than to engage, to perform outrage than to build solutions. But the peace we claim to champion demands more of us. It demands a conscious and deliberate commitment to remain constructive — to be solution- oriented even when frustration is justified, and to continually widen, rather than narrow, the constituency for peace. A broad base of support — across communities, institutions, and political lines — is not a luxury reserved for easier times; it is the most practical instrument we have for managing the inherent complexity of peace implementation. Let us be worthy of the peace we advocate.
Let me express my deepest gratitude to my colleagues in the Joint Normalization Committee on the GPH side — Undersecretary David Diciano and Lt. Gen. Danilo Pamonag (Ret.) — and to my Co-Chair Toks Ibrahim, Atty. Lai Dumama Alba, and Bapa Jerry Abubakar on the MILF side, for their unwavering commitment to the work of the JNC even in the most difficult seasons of this process.
The same expression of gratitude goes to the joint mechanisms under the normalization track — the Joint Task Forces on Camps Transformation, the Task Force on Decommissioned Combatants and their Communities, the Joint Peace and Security Teams, the mechanisms on Transitional Justice and Reconciliation, the Coordinating Committee on the Cessation of Hostilities, the Ad Hoc Joint Action Group, the Independent Decommissioning Body, and all the men and women who are silently and creatively pushing everything on the ground to fulfill the promise of this important and monumental peace process. Your work may not always make the headlines, but it is your quiet persistence that keeps the machinery of peace turning.
The Bangsamoro peace process is far from over, but it is also far from lost. Its completion is not optional — it is a moral and political obligation we owe to the Bangsamoro people and to the nation. Pagpalain Bangsamoro!
For peace, with peace.
(Ariel “Ayi” Hernandez is co-chair of the Joint Normalization Committee of the GPH-MILF Peace Process, representing the Philippine government. Hernandez issued this statement on 27 March 2026, on the 12th anniversary of the signing of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro)
