4 | EXECUTIVE VIEWS: QUICK LOOK AT THE GPH-MILF PEACE PROCESS (1992-2026)
The evolution of the Government of the Philippines-Moro Islamic Liberation Front (GPH-MILF) peace process has been shaped by the differing strategic doctrines, political wills, and peace architectures established by consecutive Presidents of the Republic. Spanning from the formal splitting of the MILF from the MNLF in the late 1970s and early 1980s to the realization of the current autonomous parliament, each administration has dramatically pivoted the trajectory of the peace panels.
a. Fidel V. Ramos (1992–1998)
President Fidel V. Ramos laid the foundational groundwork for institutionalized peacemaking by establishing the Six Paths to Peace through Executive Order No. 125, which recognized that structural reforms must accompany military actions. While his administration achieved the historic 1996 Final Peace Agreement with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), Ramos recognized the growing threat of the MILF splinter faction led by Salamat Hashim. In 1997, his administration signed the Agreement on the General Cessation of Hostilities, officially initiating formal peace negotiations with the MILF. This milestone moved the conflict away from continuous jungle warfare and into a structured, legally recognized dialogue framework, setting the precedent that the MILF must be engaged as an independent political entity rather than a minor rebel faction.
The primary challenge faced by the Ramos administration was the strategic division within the Moro rebellion itself. While Ramos focused his resources on finalizing the 1996 Peace Agreement with Nur Misuari’s Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)—led by Salamat Hashim—refused to recognize the pact. The MILF rapidly expanded its independent military camps, built a parallel Islamic governance system, and intensified its guerrilla operations, forcing the administration to open an entirely new, unmapped line of negotiations just as the MNLF track was closing.
b. Joseph Ejercito Estrada (1998–2001)
President Joseph Estrada dramatically reversed his predecessor’s peace policy by implementing a hardline militaristic approach known as the "All-Out War" doctrine in 2000. Frustrated by perceived MILF violations and the expansion of their parallel governance systems, Estrada ordered the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) to launch a massive, coordinated offensive that successfully captured 46 MILF camps, including their main headquarters, Camp Abubakar. While this military campaign dismantled the MILF's visible conventional military infrastructure, it ultimately disrupted the formal peace talks, forced the rebel front back into asymmetric guerrilla warfare, displaced hundreds of thousands of civilians, and deeply hardened Moro distrust toward the national government.
By destroying the MILF's conventional camps, the administration inadvertently destroyed the structured peace mechanisms on the ground. The MILF abandoned conventional defense, broke into small guerrilla cells, and launched a highly destructive campaign of urban bombings and retaliatory raids that hardened public resentment and deeply fractured trust between the two panels.
Estrada’s "All-Out War" doctrine created severe blowback that crippled the peace roadmap for years. While the military successfully captured physical MILF bases, the campaign displaced over one million civilians in Central Mindanao, creating a massive humanitarian and economic crisis.
c. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (2001–2010)
Upon taking office, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo immediately abandoned the all-out war strategy, declaring an "all-out peace" policy that successfully resumed formal negotiations with the MILF. Arroyo’s key contribution was the internationalization of the peace architecture, where she invited Malaysia to serve as the official third-party facilitator and institutionalized the International Monitoring Team (IMT). Her administration achieved a massive conceptual breakthrough with the framing of the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD) in 2008, which sought to establish a "Bangsamoro Juridical Entity." However, when the Supreme Court declared the MOA-AD unconstitutional due to sovereignty concerns, the peace process suffered a catastrophic collapse, triggering severe retaliatory attacks by rogue MILF commanders in Central Mindanao before negotiations could be painstakingly rebuilt.
The sudden legal collapse of the MOA-AD triggered severe frustration within the rebel front. Rogue MILF commanders led by Umbra Kato and Abdullah Macapaar launched brutal retaliatory attacks against Christian villages in North Cotabato and Lanao del Norte, causing widespread civilian casualties and driving the peace process into its deepest breakdown.
d. Benigno S. Aquino III (2010–2016)
President Benigno Aquino III provided the decisive political will necessary to achieve the ultimate breakthrough in the peace process, beginning with a historic, unprecedented secret meeting with MILF Chairman Al Haj Murad Ebrahim in Tokyo in 2011. This direct diplomatic engagement paved the way for the signing of the 2012 Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB) and culminated in the signing of the 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB), which remains the definitive, legally binding peace pact between the GPH and the MILF. The CAB established the dual-track roadmap combining political autonomy with the decommissioning of fighters; however, the legislative passage of its enabling law was completely derailed late in his term following the tragic Mamasapano clash in 2015, leaving the peace process in a fragile transition.
The sudden legal collapse of the MOA-AD triggered severe frustration within the rebel front. Rogue MILF commanders led by Umbra Kato and Abdullah Macapaar launched brutal retaliatory attacks against Christian villages in North Cotabato and Lanao del Norte, causing widespread civilian casualties and driving the peace process into its deepest breakdown.
The incident triggered a massive wave of national public outrage and shattered trust in the MILF's sincerity as a peace partner. Congressional support evaporated overnight, completely destroying Aquino’s timeline for passing the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) before his term ended, leaving the roadmap stranded in legislative limbo.
The GPH-MILF peace process achieved its most significant historical breakthroughs due to the dynamic leadership of Government (GPH) Panel Chairs Marvic Leonen and Miriam Coronel-Ferrer, alongside their rebel counterpart, MILF Panel Chair Mohagher Iqbal. Serving from 2010 to 2012, Marvic Leonen acted as the constitutional architect who successfully steered negotiations away from the legally toxic concepts that caused the 2008 MOA-AD collapse, anchoring Moro autonomy within the strict bounds of the 1987 Philippine Constitution and delivering the 2012 Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB). However, his hyper-legalistic approach deferred the volatile operational details of wealth-sharing, power-sharing, and demilitarization to subsequent annexes, leaving those sensitive bottlenecks to his successor.
Taking over the mantle from 2012 to 2016, Miriam Coronel-Ferrer became the first female chief negotiator in the world to sign a final peace accord with a major rebel front, successfully consolidating those complex operational annexes into the definitive 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB) while embedding vital gender-inclusive protections. Despite this milestone, she faced severe domestic criticism for being overly accommodating to the rebels; her fierce defense of the panels during the national outrage following the tragic 2015 Mamasapano clash preserved the ceasefire lines and prevented a return to all-out war, but it alienated conservative lawmakers, leading to a legislative stalemate that killed the enabling law during Aquino's term. Navigating these dynamics from the rebel side, Mohagher Iqbal served as the pragmatic statesman who successfully convinced the MILF's hardened military commanders to accept the "Normalization" track, agreeing to systematically decommission 40,000 combatants in exchange for genuine parliamentary self-governance. While Iqbal successfully mainstreamed the Moro struggle into the national legal fabric, his compromises alienated hardline factions who felt the front surrendered its armed leverage prematurely, fracturing the broader movement and fueling the rise of violent breakaway groups like the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF).
e. Rodrigo Roa Duterte (2016–2022)
As the first president hailing from Mindanao, Rodrigo Duterte prioritized fulfilling the promises of the CAB by utilizing his massive legislative capital to pass Republic Act No. 11054, commonly known as the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL), in 2018. Following its successful ratification in a 2019 regional plebiscite, Duterte formally dissolved the old ARMM and inaugurated the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), appointing the MILF-led Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA) to steer the region. Recognizing that the transitional government needed more time to build robust institutional codes amidst the economic shocks of the COVID-19 pandemic, Duterte signed Republic Act No. 11593 in 2021, legally extending the BARMM transition period and postponing the first regular parliamentary elections to protect the fragile peace.
While Duterte successfully passed the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL), his administration struggled deeply with the operational side of the roadmap. The target to decommission 40,000 combatants moved at a sluggish pace due to bureaucratic red tape, funding shortfalls, and disputes over the composition of socioeconomic reintegration packages.
The arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic completely paralyzed the region’s institutional rollout. Resources were diverted to public health emergencies, base transformations ground to a halt, and the newly appointed Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA) lacked the administrative capacity to build basic governance codes, forcing a controversial three-year extension of the transition timeline.
f. Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. (2022–Present)
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has focused his administration’s efforts on the complex consolidation and operationalization phases of the peace roadmap as the region transitions out of its prolonged provisional status. Marcos Jr. reappointed a unified composition of the 80-member BTA, ensuring the inclusion of previously recalcitrant factions from both the MILF and MNLF to foster deep-seated regional cohesion. His administration has consistently defended the political track by backing the institutional independence of the Bangsamoro Electoral Code and providing absolute logistical, financial, and security support for the September 14, 2026, parliamentary elections. Concurrently, his peace panels have actively engaged the MILF Central Committee to break the standstill surrounding Phase 4 of the Normalization Track, seeking to overhaul socioeconomic packages to ensure long-term stability once the elected parliament takes office.
The Marcos administration is currently confronting a critical stalemate where the MILF Central Committee has suspended Phase 4 of decommissioning, leaving roughly 14,000 combatants and thousands of weapons active on the ground. The MILF blames the government for failing to deliver the promised 100,000-peso cash stipends and sustainable livelihood assistance to previously decommissioned fighters.
The upcoming September 14, 2026, parliamentary elections have triggered a highly volatile climate of internal division. For the first time, the MILF’s political wing is experiencing a deep organizational split, running against powerful alliances of entrenched traditional political clans. With COMELEC placing 108 out of 119 regional jurisdictions on high-risk security watchlists due to threats from active clan feuds (rido) and private armed groups, the administration faces the immense challenge of policing a heavily armed, politically fractured territory ahead of the historic vote.
References:
Abad, F., & Cayongcat, A. (2009). The Supreme Court and the MOA-AD: Sovereignty, self-determination, and the boundaries of judicial review. Philippine Law Journal, 83(3), 512–545.
An Act Providing for the Bangsamoro Organic Law and Repealing for the Purpose Republic Act No. 6734, as Amended by Republic Act No. 9054, Republic Act No. 11054, 17th Cong. (2018). https://officialgazette.gov.ph
An Act Resetting the First Regular Elections in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, Amending for the Purpose Section 13, Article XVI of Republic Act No. 11054, Republic Act No. 11593, 18th Cong. (2021). https://officialgazette.gov.ph
Asian Network for Free Elections & National Democratic Institute. (2026, September 1). Promising yet fragile: Pre-election assessment report for the first BARMM parliamentary elections. ANFREL-NDI Joint Mission Reports. https://anfrel.org
Bangsamoro Transition Authority. (2023). Bangsamoro Autonomy Act No. 35: An act providing for the Bangsamoro Electoral Code. BTA Parliamentary Records.
Buendia, R. G. (2005). The GRP-MILF Peace Process: The Road to Nowhere? Philippine Political Science Journal, 26(49), 49–80. https://doi.org
Council for Climate and Conflict Action Asia. (2026, August). Guns, clans, and ballots: CEMS-ERN verified conflict data digest on the pre-election climate in BARMM. CCAA Monitoring Reports.
Commission on Elections. (2019). Report on the conduct of the plebiscite for the ratification of Republic Act No. 11054. COMELEC Government Records. Philippines.
Coronel-Ferrer, M. (2015). Weaving peace in Mindanao: Women's leadership in the GPH-MILF peace panel negotiations. Journal of International Affairs, 68(2), 101–118.
Executive Order No. 125, Defining the Approach and Administrative Structure for Government's Comprehensive Peace Efforts, s. 1993. (1993, September 15). Official Gazette of the Republic of the Philippines. https://officialgazette.gov.ph
Government of the Republic of the Philippines [GPH] & Moro Islamic Liberation Front [MILF]. (1997, July 18). Agreement on the General Cessation of Hostilities. Peace Agreements Database. https://peaceagreements.org
Government of the Republic of the Philippines [GPH] & Moro Islamic Liberation Front [MILF]. (2012, October 15). Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB). Official Gazette of the Republic of the Philippines. https://officialgazette.gov.ph
Government of the Republic of the Philippines [GPH] & Moro Islamic Liberation Front [MILF]. (2014, March 27). Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB). Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process. https://peace.gov.ph
Human Rights Watch. (2000). Philippines: Civilian toll mounts in Mindanao conflict. HRW Report Documents. https://hrw.org
Iqbal, M. (2016). Transitioning from combatants to citizens: The challenges of the Normalization Track in the Bangsamoro. Mindanao Studies Journal, 18(1), 45–67.
Independent Decommissioning Body. (2021). Socioeconomic packages and decommissioned combatants: Mid-term assessment of the Normalization Track during the COVID-19 pandemic. IDB Progress Reports.
Institute for Autonomy and Governance. (2021). Institutionalizing governance under the shadow of a pandemic: An assessment of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority. IAG Policy Briefs.
Joint Monitoring Committee. (2004). Operational guidelines for the International Monitoring Team (IMT) in Mindanao. Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process.
Leonen, M. M. V. F. (2013). Rationalizing autonomy within the 1987 Philippine Constitution: Legal frameworks of the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro. Supreme Court Judicial Journal, 4(1), 12–39.
Mercado, E. R. (2002). From the trenches: The Moro Islamic Liberation Front and the challenge of peace. Notre Dame University Press.
MindaNews. (2025, July). Normalization deadlock: Understanding the Phase 4 decommissioning impasse and the 100,000-peso cash stipend dispute. MindaNews Policy Papers. https://mindanews.com
National Bureau of Investigation [NBI]. (2015). Joint NBI-National Prosecution Service (NPS) report on the Mamasapano incident. Department of Justice. https://doj.gov.ph
Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity. (2026, August). Framework for the overhauling of the normalization socioeconomic packages: A comparative review of Colombia and the Philippines. Peace.gov.ph Publications. https://peace.gov.ph
Presidential Communications Office. (2022, August 12). President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. reappoints unified 80-member Bangsamoro Transition Authority to foster regional cohesion. Official Gazette of the Republic of the Philippines. https://officialgazette.gov.ph
Ramos, F. V. (1996). Break Not the Peace: The Story of the GRP-MNLF Peace Negotiations. Friends of Steady Eddie.
Santos, S. M., Jr. (2001). The Moro Islamic Liberation Front: A Splinter and Its Trail. In The Moro segment: Dynamics of the peace process in the Philippines (pp. 65-88). Coalition for Peace.
The Province of North Cotabato v. The Government of the Republic of the Philippines Peace Panel on Ancestral Domain, G.R. No. 183574 (Supreme Court of the Philippines October 14, 2008). https://lawphil.net
Vitug, M. D., & Gloria, G. M. (2000). Under the Crescent Moon: Rebellion in Mindanao. Institute for Popular Democracy.
World Bank & International Alert. (2011). Land ownership and shadow conflicts in Central Mindanao: Post-MOA-AD violence assessment. World Bank Country Studies.
World Bank & International Alert. (2011). Land ownership and shadow conflicts in Central Mindanao: Post-MOA-AD violence assessment. World Bank Country Studies.
