(May 6, 2022) – The founder and leader of a Muslim rebel group that struck a peace deal with the government denied the group had endorsed the candidacy of the only son and namesake of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., an official of the organization said on Friday, debunking a press statement from the candidate’s camp.
Rolando Olamit, secretary general of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), said the group’s chairman Nur Misuari was misquoted by Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.’s camp to claim that he had endorsed his candidacy.
“It was a twisted piece of information,” Olamit said in a video message to another presidential candidate, Senator Emmanuel “Manny” Pacquiao, partly in Cebuano. “If you want to listen to the video (of Misuari’s statement) carefully, he made no endorsement for BBM (Bongbong Marcos).”
In a Facebook page named “MNLF Moro National Liberation Front – Members of OIC, PUIC”, it posted video clips of Misuari, who was in a Organization of Islamic Conference meeting in Saudi Arabia, claiming that he has endorsed Marcos Jr. and his running mate Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio.
In the video itself, he did not categorically endorse Marcos Jr., but was only advising the public to judge the former senator based on his own merits rather than by his father’s atrocities.
“I had a very sad memory about the governance of the late president Marcos, not necessarily against his son,” Misuari had said. “As I said time and again, the fault of the father cannot be inherited unnecessarily by the children or by his sons or daughters.”
But he did say in the video that he favored Duterte-Carpio among the vice presidential bets he knew of due to his close ties with her father, President Rodrigo Duterte.
The group is still waiting for Misuari, who is still in Saudi Arabia, for his official statement on the matter, MNLF said.
The MNLF was formed in the late 1960s and waged a secessionist war after reports filtered that Marcos massacred Muslim recruits who were training in Corregifor for an invasion of Sabah, an eastern Malaysia state on the tip of Borneo island. Sabah was claimed by the Philippines because it was a property owned by the Sultan of Sulu.
Known as the “Jabidah massacre”, it occurred under Marcos’ rule, where numerous Moro army recruits were reportedly killed under the then president’s orders. It is widely considered the catalyst to the Moro secessionist movement in Mindanao.
In 1996, the MNLF signed a peace agreement with the government and accepted autonomy, Misuari became the governor of the Automomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.
Marcos Jr’s spokesman Vic Rodriguez thanked Misuari for his remarks, which he called an “endorsement” in his statement.
Reacting to Rodriguez’ statement, MNLF criticized Rodriguez for “making the worst fake news item that has hounded many news desks and media entities.”
Marcos Jr., who has been criticized for the delay in the passage of the Bangsamoro Basic Law when he was a senator, last month said that the government has already “done everything” to bring peace to the Muslims in Mindanao.
(MM)
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